Patent ID: 8745735

Claim:
A monitoring system comprising a program execution apparatus and a server apparatus, wherein the program execution apparatus includes a plurality of modules including at least three monitoring modules, the monitoring modules each monitoring at least another one of the plurality of modules as to whether the at least another one module performs malicious operations and (ii) being monitored by at least another one of the monitoring modules, and each of the monitoring modules including: a holding unit operable to hold therein a piece of monitoring target information indicating at least another one of the plurality of modules as a monitoring target; a monitoring unit operable to monitor the at least another one module indicated by the piece of monitoring target information; a transmission unit operable to transmit a result of the monitoring to the server apparatus; and an update unit operable, when acquiring a new piece of monitoring target information for update from the server apparatus, to update the held piece of monitoring target information with the new piece of monitoring target information, and wherein the server apparatus includes: an acquisition unit operable to acquire the results of the monitoring performed by the respective monitoring modules; a specification unit operable to specify, based on all the acquired results of the monitoring, which of the plurality of modules performs malicious operations; and a transmission unit operable to (i) hold therein pieces of monitoring target information that are the same as the pieces of monitoring target information held in the respective monitoring modules, (ii) when the specified module is any of the monitoring modules, restructure the pieces of monitoring target information held therein such that the monitoring modules except the specified module are each monitored by at least another one of the monitoring modules except the specified module, and (iii) transmit, to any of the monitoring modules whose piece of monitoring target information needs to be updated as a result of the restructuring, one of the restructured pieces of monitoring target information to the corresponding monitoring module.