The Security Lab (SeclaBU) in the ECE Department at Boston University works on securing software systems from threats such as software vulnerabilities, attacks, and other types of malicious and harmful activity. The members of the lab apply a variety of techniques from a number of fields (program analysis, machine learning, computational social science) to better understand such systems and the way in which people interact with them and misuse them, with the goal of coming up with solutions that are both effective and practical. Research from the lab is routinely published in top computer security venues (IEEE S&P, ACM CCS, NDSS, Usenix Security) and top Web and measurement venues (WWW, ACM IMC, AAAI ICWSM).
10/15/2023 - Our paper Sliding into My DMs: Detecting Uncomfortable or Unsafe Sexual Risk Experiences within Instagram Direct Messages Grounded in the Perspective of Youth received an Impact Recognition at the CSCW 2023.
9/11/2023 - Our paper "Why So Toxic? Measuring and Triggering Toxic Behavior in Open-Domain Chatbots" was selected as a finalist at the CSAW Research Competition (Europe) 2023.
8/3/2023 - Prof. Stringhini was interviewed by The Brink about his research journey.
11/9/2022 - Our paper "Why So Toxic? Measuring and Triggering Toxic Behavior in Open-Domain Chatbots" received an Honorable Mention at CCS 2022.
4/30/2022 - Our paper "Understanding the Digital Lives of Youth: Analyzing Media Shared within Safe Versus Unsafe Private Conversations on Instagram" received an Honorable Mention at CHI 2022.
6/11/2020 - Our paper "Disturbed YouTube for Kids: Characterizing and Detecting Inappropriate Videos Targeting Young Children" received an Honorable Mention at ICWSM 2020.
6/19/2019 - Our paper "On the Perils of Leaking Referrers in Online Collaboration Services" was awarded the Best Paper Award at DIMVA 2019.
5/13/2019 - Our paper "Disinformation Warfare: Understanding State-Sponsored Trolls on Twitter and their Influence on the Web" was awarded the Best Paper Award at CYBERSAFETY 2019.
10/31/2018 - Our paper "On the Origins of Memes by Means of Fringe Web Communities" was awarded a Distinguished Paper Award at IMC 2018.
9/15/2018 - Our paper "Tiresias: Predicting Security Events through Deep Learning" was selected as a finalist at the Europe CSAW Applied Research Competition.
8/27/2018 - Our paper "Taxonomist: Application Detection through Rich Monitoring Data" was awarded the Best Artifact Award at Euro-Par 2018.
8/8/2018 - Professor Stringhini was awarded a Secure the Internet Grant by Facebook.
6/4/2018 - Our paper "Hardware Performance Counters Can Detect Malware: Myth or Fact?" was awarded the Best Paper Award at ASIA CCS 2018.
5/21/2018 - Professor Egele was presented with a Distinguished Reviewer Award from the IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (Oakland).
