ABOUT ME

I am an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Boston University, where I co-direct the Security Lab (SeclaBU). Between 2014 and 2018 I was faculty in the Departments of Computer Science and Security and Crime Science at University College London (UCL). I am part of the iDRAMA Lab and of the International Secure Systems Lab. I am an affiliated faculty in the Faculty of Computing & Data Sciences, in the Computer Science Department, and in the Center for Antiracist Research at BU, and a Junior Faculty Fellow at the Hariri Institute for Computing.

I was awarded an NSF CAREER Award in 2020, a Facebook Secure the Internet Grant in 2018, a UCL BEAMS Future Leaders in Engineering and Physical Sciences Award in 2016, a Google Research Award in 2015, the Outstanding Dissertation Award from the Department of Computer Science at UCSB in 2014, and a Symantec Research Labs Graduate Fellowship in 2012.

MY RESEARCH

In my research I apply a data-driven approach to better understand malicious activity on the Internet. Through the collection and analysis of large-scale datasets, I develop novel and robust mitigation techniques to make the Internet a safer place. My research involves a mix of quantitative analysis, (some) qualitative analysis, machine learning, crime science, and systems design.

As examples, recently I have been investigating the spread of alternative news and memes on online social networks, raids organized by trolls against other Internet users, the evolution of cyberattacks, cyberbullying, ransomware, online dating scams, money laundering schemes linked to cybercrime, malware delivery networks, and online social network compromises.

My research is supported by the NSF, Google, and Facebook.

RECENT SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

The Gospel According to Q: Understanding the QAnon Conspiracy from the Perspective of Canonical Information

Max Aliapoulios, Antonis Papasavva, Cameron Ballard, Emiliano De Cristofaro, Gianluca Stringhini, Savvas Zannettou, and Jeremy Blackburn. ICWSM, 2022.

Does Platform Migration Compromise Content Moderation? Evidence from r/The_Donald and r/Incels

Manoel Horta Ribeiro, Shagun Jhaver, Savvas Zannettou, Jeremy Blackburn, Emiliano De Cristofaro, Gianluca Stringhini, and Robert West. CSCW, 2021.

“I’m a Professor, which isn’t usually a dangerous job”: Internet-Facilitated Harassment and its Impact on Researchers

Periwinkle Doerfler, Andrea Forte, Emiliano De Cristofaro, Jeremy Blackburn, Gianluca Stringhini, and Damon McCoy. CSCW, 2021.

SocialHEISTing: Understanding Stolen Facebook Accounts

Jeremiah Onaolapo, Nektarios Leontiadis, Despoina Magka, and Gianluca Stringhini. USENIX Security, 2021.

Dissecting the Meme Magic: Understanding Indicators of Virality in Image Memes

Chen Ling, Ihab AbuHilal, Jeremy Blackburn, Emiliano De Cristofaro, Savvas Zannettou, and Gianluca Stringhini. CSCW, 2021.

A First Look at Zoombombing

Chen Ling, Utkucan Balci, Jeremy Blackburn, and Gianluca Stringhini. OAKLAND, 2021.

"Go eat a bat, Chang!": An Early Look on the Emergence of Sinophobic Behavior on Web Communities in the Face of COVID-19

Fatemeh Tahmasbi, Leonard Schild, Chen Ling, Jeremy Blackburn, Gianluca Stringhini, Yang Zhang, and Savvas Zannettou. WWW, 2021.

"Is it a Qoincidence?": A First Step Towards Understanding and Characterizing the QAnon Movement on Voat.co

Antonis Papasavva, Jeremy Blackburn, Gianluca Stringhini, Savvas Zannettou, and Emiliano De Cristofaro. WWW, 2021.

To Err.Is Human: Characterizing the Threat of Unintended URLs in Social Media

Beliz Kaleli, Brian Kondracki, Manuel Egele, Nick Nikiforakis, and Gianluca Stringhini. NDSS, 2021.

Understanding the Use of Fauxtography on Social Media

Yuping Wang, Fatemeh Tahmasbi, Jeremy Blackburn, Barry Bradlyn, Emiliano De Cristofaro, David Magerman, Savvas Zannettou, and Gianluca Stringhini. ICWSM, 2021.

SoK: Hate, Harassment, and the Changing Landscape of Online Abuse

Kurt Thomas, Devdatta Akhawe, Michael Bailey, Dan Boneh, Elie Bursztein, Sunny Consolvo, Nicola Dell, Zakir Durumeric, Patrick Gage Kelley, Deepak Kumar, Damon McCoy, Sarah Meiklejohn, Thomas Ristenpart, and Gianluca Stringhini. OAKLAND, 2021.

Understanding Worldwide Private Information Collection on Android

Yun Shen, Pierre-Antoine Vervier, and Gianluca Stringhini. NDSS, 2021.

The Evolution of the Manosphere Across the Web

Manoel Horta Ribeiro, Jeremy Blackburn, Barry Bradlyn, Emiliano De Cristofaro, Gianluca Stringhini, Summer Long, Stephanie Greenberg, Savvas Zannettou. ICWSM, 2021.

Characterizing the Use of Images by State-Sponsored Troll Accounts on Twitter

Savvas Zannettou, Barry Bradlyn, Emiliano De Cristofaro, Gianluca Stringhini, and Jeremy Blackburn. ICWSM, 2020.

Disturbed YouTube for Kids: Characterizing and Detecting Inappropriate Videos Targeting Young Children

Konstantinos Papadamou, Antonis Papasavva, Savvas Zannettou, Jeremy Blackburn, Nicolas Kourtellis, Ilias Leontiadis, Gianluca Stringhini, and Michael Sirivianos. ICWSM, 2020.

“You Know What to Do”: Proactive Detection of YouTube Videos Targeted by Coordinated Hate Attacks

Enrico Mariconti, Guillermo Suarez-Tangil, Jeremy Blackburn, Emiliano De Cristofaro, Nicolas Kourtellis, Ilias Leontiadis, Jordi Lugue Serrano, and Gianluca Stringhini. CSCW, 2019.

attack2vec: Leveraging Temporal Word Embeddings to Understand the Evolution of Cyberattacks

Yun Shen and Gianluca Stringhini. USENIX Security, 2019.

Pythia: a Framework for the Automated Analysis of Web Hosting Environments

Srdjan Matic, Gareth Tyson, and Gianluca Stringhini. WWW, 2019.

Who Watches the Watchmen: Exploring Complaints on the Web

Damilola Ibosiola, Ignacio Castro, Gianluca Stringhini, Steve Uhlig, and Gareth Tyson. WWW, 2019.

Tiresias: Predicting Security Events Through Deep Learning

Yun Shen, Enrico Mariconti, Pierre-Antoine Verver, and Gianluca Stringhini. CCS, 2018.

On the Origins of Memes by Means of Fringe Web Communities

Savvas Zannettou, Tristan Caulfield, Jeremy Blackburn, Emiliano De Cristofaro, Michael Sirivianos, Gianluca Stringhini, and Guillermo Suarez-Tangil. IMC, 2018.

Movie Pirates of the Caribbean: Exploring Illegal Streaming Cyberlockers

Damilola Ibosiola, Benjamin Steer, Alvaro Garcia-Recuero, Gianluca Stringhini, Steve Uhlig, and Gareth Tyson. ICWSM, 2018.

Understanding Web Archiving Services and Their (Mis)Use on Social Media

Savvas Zannettou, Jeremy Blackburn, Emiliano De Cristofaro, Michael Sirivianos, and Gianluca Stringhini. ICWSM, 2018.

You are your Metadata: Identification and Obfuscation of Social Media Users using Metadata Information

Beatrice Perez, Mirco Musolesi, and Gianluca Stringhini. ICWSM, 2018.

Ex-Ray: Detection of History-Leaking Browser Extensions

Michael Weissbacher, Enrico Mariconti, Guillermo Suarez-Tangil, Gianluca Stringhini, William Robertson, and Engin Kirda. ACSAC, 2017.

The Web Centipede: Understanding How Web Communities Influence Each Other Through the Lens of Mainstream and Alternative News Sources

Savvas Zannettou, Tristan Caulfield, Emiliano De Cristofaro, Nicolas Kourtellis, Ilias Leontiadis, Michael Sirivianos, Gianuca Stringhini, and Jeremy Blackburn. IMC, 2017.

POISED: Spotting Twitter Spam Off the Beaten Paths

Shirin Nilizadeh, Francois Labreche, Ali Zand, Alireza Sadighian, Jose Fernandez, Christopher Kruegel, Gianluca Stringhini, and Giovanni Vigna. CCS, 2017.

Kek, Cucks, and God Emperor Trump: A Measurement Study of 4chan's Politically Incorrect Forum and its Effects on the Web

Gabriel Emile Hine, Jeremiah Onaolapo, Emiliano De Cristofaro, Nicolas Kourtellis, Ilias Leontiadis, Riginos Samaras, Gianluca Stringhini, and Jeremy Blackburn. ICWSM, 2017.

What's in a Name? Understanding Profile Name Reuse on Twitter

Enrico Mariconti, Jeremiah Onaolapo, Syed Sharique Ahmad, Nicolas Nikiforou, Manuel Egele, Nick Nikiforakis, and Gianluca Stringhini. WWW, 2017.

MaMaDroid: Detecting Android Malware by Building Markov Chains of Behavioral Models

Enrico Mariconti, Lucky Onwuzurike, Panagiotis Andriotis, Emiliano De Cristofaro, Gordon Ross, and Gianluca Stringhini. NDSS, 2017.

What Happens After You Are Pwnd: Understanding The Use of Leaked Webmail Credentials In The Wild

Jeremiah Onaolapo, Enrico Mariconti, and Gianluca Stringhini. IMC, 2016.