Vyas Sekar
Tan Family Professor, Electrical and Computer Engineering
Vyas Sekar is a professor in the Department of Electrical and Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University, and is affiliated with the CyLab Security and Privacy Institute. His research is at the intersection of networking, security, and systems. Sekar's current research focuses on systems for accelerating the deployment of innovative network middleboxes, and designing content distribution mechanisms to improve user experience.
Sekar received his Ph.D. from the Computer Science Department at Carnegie Mellon University in 2010. He has been the recipient of multiple awards, including a National Science Foundation CAREER Award in 2016. He earned his bachelor's degree from the Indian Institute of Technology Madras, where he was awarded the President of India Gold Medal. His work has been recognized with best paper awards at ACM SIGCOMM, ACM CoNext, and ACM Multimedia. In addition to being a professor of electrical and computer engineering, Sekar is affiliated with the CyLab Security and Privacy Institute.
Network Security: Making the Internet a Safer Place
Improving Video Streaming
Education
2010 Ph.D., Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University
2003 BS, Computer Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Chennai
Affiliations
Research Interests
- access control and authorization
- AI and ML for security
- anonymity
- Applications of security and privacy
- authentication and passwords
- automotive and transportation security and privacy
- autonomy
- censorship resistance and measurement
- cloud security
- computer security
- computer/storage systems
- cyber physical systems security and privacy
- cyberphysical systems (CPS)
- cybersecurity + privacy
- digital twins
- distributed systems
- embedded systems security
- emerging applications security
- energy and critical infrastructure security
- Formal methods
- formal methods for security
- hardware security
- information networking
- Internet of Things (IoT)
- intrusion and anomaly detection and prevention
- IoT security and privacy
- manufacturing security
- Measurement and analysis
- ML and AI
- mobile and app security and privacy
- mobile systems
- network security
- protocol security
- secure systems
- security and privacy economics
- smart infrastructure
- software security
- systems security
- threat analysis and modeling
- Usability and human behavior
- verification
- web security
Media mentions
CMU Engineering
When LLMs autonomously attack
Carnegie Mellon researchers show how LLMs can be taught to autonomously plan and execute real-world cyberattacks against enterprise-grade network environments—and why this matters for future defenses.
CyLab Security and Privacy Institute
Energy and Innovation
Advances in AI mean increasingly sophisticated cybersecurity threats. CMU is well positioned to meet these challenges with innovative solutions spun out of the CyLab Security and Privacy Institute, which coordinates cybersecurity research and education across all university departments.
CyLab Security and Privacy Institute
CyLab faculty, students to present at NDSS Symposium 2025
Carnegie Mellon faculty and students will present on a wide range of topics at the 32nd Annual Network and Distributed System Security (NDSS) Symposium. Held at Wyndham San Diego Bayside from February 24th through the 28th, the event fosters information exchange among researchers and practitioners of network and distributed system security.
CyLab Security and Privacy Institute
Alina Oprea receives 2024 CyLab Distinguished Alumni Award
Alina Oprea, professor in the Khoury College of Computer Sciences at Northeastern University, has been named CyLab's 2024 Distinguished Alumni Award recipient.
CyLab Security and Privacy Institute
CyLab researchers present research at the IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy
CyLab faculty members and students presented their research on topics ranging from mobile money practices in Africa to uncovering and identifying side-channel and evasion attacks at the 45th Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Symposium on Security and Privacy.
CyLab Security and Privacy Institute
CyLab researchers present at ACM CHI 2024
CyLab Security and Privacy Institute researchers presented 10 papers and participated in one special interest group at the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2024).
CyLab Security and Privacy Institute
CyLab faculty, students to present at NDSS Symposium 2024
Carnegie Mellon faculty and students will present on a wide range of topics at the 31st Annual Network and Distributed System Security (NDSS) Symposium. Held at the Catamaran Resort Hotel & Spa in San Diego from February 26 through March 1, the event fosters information exchange among researchers and practitioners of network and distributed system security.
CMU Engineering
CMU partners to reimagine energy in the region
Faculty from Carnegie Mellon University will collaborate with West Virginia University and University of Pittsburgh on a National Science Foundation Regional Innovation Engines program.
The Atlantic
Sekar on how cyberattacks could affect smart cars
CyLab/ECE’s Vyas Sekar explains how smart cars may be at risk of cyberattacks.
The Atlantic
Sekar quoted on EV cyberattacks
ECE’s Vyas Sekar discussed the potential cyber threats associated with connected electric vehicles.
CyLab Security and Privacy Institute
First round of Future Enterprise Security Initiative funded projects announced
CyLab’s Future Enterprise Security Initiative is underway as the first round of funded proposals has been announced.
CyLab Security and Privacy Institute
Nokia Bell Labs sponsors CyLab’s Future Enterprise Security Initiative
Nokia Bell Labs expands its partnership with Carnegie Mellon University, becoming a sponsor of CyLab's Future Enterprise Security Initiative.