2025 News

2025

2024 2026

Dec 23

CMU hosts researchers and industry experts for the third annual Secure Blockchain Summit

To address research and industry challenges around distributed ledger technologies, Carnegie Mellon University’s Secure Blockchain Initiative (SBI) brought together the foremost blockchain researchers and industry experts for the third annual Secure Blockchain Summit.

Dec 18

Taha Khan and building the system development mindset

Associate Teaching Professor Taha Khan is the latest addition to the Information Networking Institute (INI) faculty. Drawing from his interest in cybercrime, usable security and online censorship, Khan is thrilled to be guiding the next generation of cybersecurity experts through courses that build fundamental knowledge, critical thinking and problem-solving.

Dec 16

Photo of students presenting their research posters at the 2025 CyLab Partners Conference

Carnegie Mellon University earns top national rankings in cybersecurity education

Carnegie Mellon University has been recognized as a national leader in cybersecurity education, earning the No. 1 ranking for undergraduate cybersecurity programs in the 2026 U.S. News & World Report rankings and the No. 1 ranking for in-person cybersecurity master’s programs in Fortune Magazine’s 2025 rankings.

Dec 02

Photo of Lorrie Cranor reading to children at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh during Data Privacy Day 2025

New children’s book from CyLab privacy scholar helps young children understand why privacy matters

Lorrie Cranor's new book "Privacy, Please!," illustrated by Alena Karabach, offers families a gentle and engaging way to talk to children ages 4 to 6 about personal boundaries, independence, and digital safety.

Nov 25

At the intersection of energy and security Opens in new window

As Associate Laboratory Director, Energy Security, Resilience, and Integration at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Juan Torres works at the nexus of energy systems and cybersecurity principles every day.

Nov 24

Carnegie Mellon’s Privacy Engineering Certificate program adds new focus on AI governance

Carnegie Mellon University is expanding its now five-week Certificate Program in Privacy Engineering and AI Governance, adding a dedicated module on AI governance beginning in February 2026.

Nov 21

CyLab hosts industry leaders at the 2025 Partners Conference

CyLab's focus on institutional and corporate collaboration was on full display at its annual Partners Conference, which highlighted the latest research in security and privacy with an interactive forum between faculty, students, industry, and government.

Nov 14

Photo of Lorrie Cranor moderating a panel discussion at the 2025 CyLab Partners Conference

Beyond the fine print

Led by Lorrie Cranor, CyLab director, a team of researchers recently set out to explore how digital platforms can better empower users to make informed privacy decisions.

Nov 12

Photo of Elijah Bouma-Sims presenting his research at the 2025 ACM-CCS Conference

CyLab research highlights the human side of scam recovery

A team of CyLab researchers recently investigated how scam victims use online communities as a resource when seeking answers to difficult questions.

Nov 07

Photo of CyLab student presenting a research poster

Applications open for CMU Ph.D. programs in cybersecurity and privacy

Carnegie Mellon University offers several Ph.D. programs that attract students interested in pursuing research careers in security and privacy.

Nov 05

CyLab faculty share their insights at the 2025 Global Cybersecurity Forum

Three faculty members from Carnegie Mellon University’s CyLab Security and Privacy Institute participated in panels at the Global Cybersecurity Forum’s (GCF) 2025 Annual Meeting.

Oct 29

Akinci appointed Dean of College of Engineering Opens in new window

Burcu Akinci has been appointed the next Dean of CMU’s College of Engineering, effective January 1, 2026.

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Oct 28

INI faculty share cybersecurity insights in honor of Cybersecurity Awareness Month

We asked some of our faculty to share their insights on the current state of cybersecurity and how they see the field evolving. Their perspectives range from the intersection of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and cybersecurity to the advances of quantum computing to the role that everyday people play in maintaining a secure ecosystem.

Oct 27

Fredrikson receives Test of Time Award

Carnegie Mellon University's Matt Fredrikson has received the 2025 ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) Test-of-Time Award, honoring research with enduring impact in computer and communications security.

Oct 23

Image of Lorrie Cranor posing in front of a branded backdrop at the 2025 Stibitz-Wilson Awards

Lorrie Cranor honored as 2025 Stibitz-Wilson Award recipient

Lorrie Cranor, Director of the CyLab Security and Privacy Institute, is one of five recipients of the 2025 American Computer & Robotics Museum’s (ACRM) Stibitz-Wilson Awards, recognizing pioneering individuals whose work has powerfully impacted modern life.

Oct 20

CyLab names 2025 Presidential Fellows

Each year, CyLab recognizes high-achieving Ph.D. students pursuing security and/or privacy-related research, with a CyLab Presidential Fellowship, covering an entire year of tuition.

Oct 14

Image of a group of adults watching a demonstration of a two small robotic vehicles on a small indoor track

CyLab researchers present findings from the Robotics Security and Privacy Workshop in a new technical report and upcoming seminar

Organizers of the CyLab Robotics Security and Privacy Workshop have summarized its findings in a technical report published this week, and they’ll be presenting the takeaways at a CyLab Seminar Series event on Monday, October 20.

Oct 13

Researchers uncover “Pixnapping,” a new class of Android attacks that can steal on-screen data in seconds

A team of researchers featuring Riccardo Paccagnella, assistant professor in Carnegie Mellon University’s Software and Societal Systems Department (S3D), has uncovered a new class of Android attacks that can stealthily steal sensitive information displayed by other apps or even websites.

Oct 09

CyLab faculty, students to present at ACM CCS 2025

Carnegie Mellon faculty and students will present on a wide range of topics at the Association for Computing Machinery Special Interest Group on Security, Audit and Control’s (SIGSAC’s) Conference on Computer and Communications Security (ACM CCS). Held at the Taipei International Convention Center in Taipei, Taiwan on October 13-17, the event brings together information security researchers, practitioners, developers, and users from all over the world to explore cutting-edge ideas and results.

Aug 26

Serge Egelman receives 2025 CyLab Distinguished Alumni Award

Serge Egelman, founder and chief scientist at AppCensus, has been named CyLab's 2025 Distinguished Alumni Award recipient, in honor of his impactful contributions to privacy research, policy, and industry innovation.

Aug 11

2025 DEF CON Capture-the-Flag champions group photo

Carnegie Mellon’s hacking team wins fourth straight, record ninth overall DEF CON Capture-the-Flag title

The winningest team in DEF CON’s Capture-the-Flag (CTF) competition history, Carnegie Mellon University’s Plaid Parliament of Pwning (PPP), won its fourth consecutive title, earning its ninth victory in the past 13 years.

Aug 07

CyLab faculty, students to present at the 34th USENIX Security Symposium

Carnegie Mellon faculty and students will present on a wide range of topics at the 34th USENIX Security Symposium. Held in Seattle on August 13-15, the event brings together experts from around the world, who will highlight the latest advances in the security and privacy of computer systems and networks.

Aug 06

Secure Software by Design 2025 brings experts together to shape the future of cybersecurity engineering

CyLab is collaborating with Carnegie Mellon University’s Software Engineering Institute (SEI) to convene leaders and practitioners in secure software development for the Third Annual Secure Software by Design event, to be held in Arlington, Va. on August 19th and 20th.

Aug 04

CyLab researchers present their work at SOUPS 2025

Carnegie Mellon faculty and students will share their research at the 2025 Symposium on Usable Privacy and Security (SOUPS), which takes place August 10-12 in Seattle.

Jul 24

Digital illustration of a robotic hand with a finger pointing at a lock

When LLMs autonomously attack Opens in new window

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.

Research paper Opens in new window

Jul 14

picoCTF aims to close the cybersecurity talent gap

CyLab's picoCTF is working to close the cybersecurity talent gap by introducing the future workforce to the field through its free annual hacking competition and robust learning platform.

Jul 13

Photo of the Carnegie Mellon University campus

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.

Jul 12

Image of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.

CyLab researchers set to present their work at PETS 2025

Carnegie Mellon University faculty members and students will share their research at the 2025 Privacy Enhancing Technologies Symposium (PETS). Held annually, the 25th PETS will be a hybrid event taking place July 14-19, with a physical gathering held in Washington, D.C. and a concurrent virtual event.

Jul 11

A woman in a lab holding up a container full of liquid while others look on

CMU’s Critical Technology Institute hosts DARPA fellows Opens in new window

DARPA fellows hear from CMU faculty about emerging technologies, cybersecurity initiatives, and advancing academic and government partnerships.

Jul 10

Animation of a laptop plugged into a data center power source

A cross-stack solution for energy-efficient data centers Opens in new window

GPUs, or graphics processing units, are the building blocks for many AI tools, but a single unit can consume as much power as a dishwasher or a microwave.

Jun 18

CyLab to host Robotics Security and Privacy Workshop July 28-29

On July 28-29, CyLab will host a Robotics Security and Privacy Workshop on the Carnegie Mellon University campus, convening leading researchers and experts from across academia and industry to discuss strategic approaches to building trusted middleware and toolchains to foster a secure, privacy-preserving robotics ecosystem that is safe and trustworthy by design.

Jun 17

CyLab researchers to present at PLDI 2025

Carnegie Mellon University researchers are set to present five papers and chair one program session at the 46th ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation (PLDI 2025).

Jun 16

Photo of Lorrie Cranor and Norman Sadeh presenting at PEPR '25

New privacy threat modeling framework takes a user-centric perspective

A new framework developed at CMU seeks to improve privacy notices and choices, which could give users more autonomy over their digital footprint.

Jun 11

Poisoned datasets put AI models at risk for attack

Large language models can become compromised when their training datasets are intentionally poisoned by malicious attackers. CyLab researchers have demonstrated that manipulating as little as 0.1 percent of a model's pre-training dataset is sufficient to launch effective data poisoning attacks.

Jun 02

picoCTF-Africa returns with a continent-wide training tour Opens in new window

The annual computer security competition returned for its fourth year—this time with a continent-wide training tour in 13 countries.

May 27

CyLab researchers to present at USENIX PEPR 2025

CyLab Security and Privacy Institute researchers are set to lead three presentations at the 2025 USENIX Conference on Privacy Engineering Practice and Respect (PEPR '25).

May 21

A student putting something in a machine in a lab

Presidential and graduate fellowships announced for 2024-2025 Opens in new window

College of Engineering students have been awarded fellowships for the 2024-2025 academic year.

May 13

CMU hacking team wins unprecedented fourth straight title at MITRE cybersecurity competition

For the fourth consecutive year, Carnegie Mellon’s competitive hacking team, the Plaid Parliament of Pwning (PPP), has taken home the top prize at the MITRE Embedded Capture-the-Flag (eCTF) cybersecurity competition. CMU’s win marks the first time in the 10-year history of the MITRE eCTF competition that a team has won four consecutive titles.

May 08

Photo of Carnegie Mellon University campus

CMU re-designated as National Center for Academic Excellence

Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) has once again earned two national distinctions from the National Center for Academic Excellence in Cybersecurity (NCAE-C): Cyber Research (CAE-R) and Cyber Operations (CAE-CO).

Apr 30

Cybersecurity educators should share resources to teach students important technical and non-technical skills

In a new article, researchers argue that cybersecurity educators need to share teaching resources to teach students critical technical and non-technical skills, and they describe a course they created that allows for such sharing to take place.

Apr 28

Screen shot image of the Purpose Mode Google Chrome extension

Purpose Mode helps social media users stay focused on their desired tasks

A CMU research team has developed Purpose Mode — a browser extension that allows users to “toggle off” Attention Capture Damaging Patterns (ACDPs) while using social media platforms.

Apr 25

Space-tolerant computer chips Opens in new window

Researchers develop microelectronics for space and aerospace applications.

Apr 16

Michael Mattarock joins CMU INI as its new associate director

Michael Mattarock, CyLab faculty member, has joined the Information Networking Institute (INI) as its new associate director and assistant teaching professor.

Apr 04

Protecting audio privacy at the source

To allow audio sensing without compromising privacy, researchers at Carnegie Mellon University developed an on-device filter, called Kirigami, that can detect and delete human speech segments collected by audio sensors before they're used for activity recognition.

Apr 01

Patrick Gage Kelley accepting the 2025 USEC Test of Time Award

CyLab researchers win Test of Time Award at USEC 2025

A team featuring CyLab researchers was honored with the Test of Time Award at the 2025 Symposium on Usable Security and Privacy (USEC 2025).

Mar 25

CyLab announces third round of Secure Blockchain Initiative funded projects

Carnegie Mellon University's Secure Blockchain Initiative (SBI) has announced its third round of funded proposals, providing $130K to six groundbreaking research projects that are exploring the security and privacy of distributed ledger technology.

Mar 14

CyLab researchers present at ACM CHI 2025

CyLab Security and Privacy Institute researchers will present nine papers and teach one course at the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2025).

Mar 03

picoCTF capture-the-flag competition prepares students for rewarding careers in cybersecurity

picoCTF’s 12th annual capture-the-flag hacking competition for middle school, high school, and college students will take place from March 7 through March 17. Students interested in participating can register now by signing up for a free account at picoctf.org.

Feb 28

A cybersecurity question answering assistant that motivates users to follow its advice

A team of Carnegie Mellon University researchers is studying prompt engineering techniques that could coax large language models (LLMs) to generate more effective answers to everyday cybersecurity questions.

Feb 21

Understanding YouTube giveaway scams: are teens more susceptible?

A team of Carnegie Mellon University researchers recently conducted human subjects research to learn more about the nature of YouTube giveaway scams, and determine whether teens are more susceptible to falling for them than adults.

Feb 20

Moderating content for end-to-end encryption

Sarah Scheffler, assistant professor of Software and Societal Systems and Engineering and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon University, is currently conducting research that explores alternative content moderation methods for end-to-end-encryption (E2EE) that are still private and secure.

Jan 28

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.

Jan 23

CyLab awards 2025 seed funding

This year, CyLab has awarded more than $400K in seed funding to 16 CMU students, faculty, and staff members from five departments at the university.

Jan 23

Fostering the next generation of thinkers in digital identity Opens in new window

CMU-Africa's Upanzi Network and MicroSave Consulting (MSC) have developed a series of regional hackathons across Africa to uncover some of these untapped opportunities through new innovative digital ID use cases.

Jan 15

CMU and CLP Celebrate International Data Privacy Day on January 26

In celebration of International Privacy Day, Carnegie Mellon University is collaborating with Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh (CLP) to host Data Privacy Day 2025 on Sunday, January 26 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at CLP-Main (Oakland).

Jan 08

Improving privacy for digital public goods Opens in new window

Researchers with the Upanzi Network have developed recommendations for the Digital Public Goods Alliance to increase transparency about users’ data privacy.

Jan 06

Student bug bounty discovery supports picoCTF’s cybersecurity education efforts with $462,000 gift

Seunghyun Lee, a first-year Ph.D. student in Carnegie Mellon University’s Computer Science Department, recently discovered a series of bugs in Google Chrome's WebAssembly type system that earned him a bug bounty, which he generously donated to CMU's picoCTF cybersecurity education platform.

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2025

CMU hosts researchers and industry experts for the third annual Secure Blockchain Summit

Taha Khan and building the system development mindset

Carnegie Mellon University earns top national rankings in cybersecurity education

New children’s book from CyLab privacy scholar helps young children understand why privacy matters

At the intersection of energy and security Opens in new window

Carnegie Mellon’s Privacy Engineering Certificate program adds new focus on AI governance

CyLab hosts industry leaders at the 2025 Partners Conference

Beyond the fine print

CyLab research highlights the human side of scam recovery

Applications open for CMU Ph.D. programs in cybersecurity and privacy

CyLab faculty share their insights at the 2025 Global Cybersecurity Forum

Akinci appointed Dean of College of Engineering Opens in new window

INI faculty share cybersecurity insights in honor of Cybersecurity Awareness Month

Fredrikson receives Test of Time Award

Lorrie Cranor honored as 2025 Stibitz-Wilson Award recipient

CyLab names 2025 Presidential Fellows

CyLab researchers present findings from the Robotics Security and Privacy Workshop in a new technical report and upcoming seminar

Researchers uncover “Pixnapping,” a new class of Android attacks that can steal on-screen data in seconds

CyLab faculty, students to present at ACM CCS 2025

Serge Egelman receives 2025 CyLab Distinguished Alumni Award

Carnegie Mellon’s hacking team wins fourth straight, record ninth overall DEF CON Capture-the-Flag title

CyLab faculty, students to present at the 34th USENIX Security Symposium

Secure Software by Design 2025 brings experts together to shape the future of cybersecurity engineering

CyLab researchers present their work at SOUPS 2025

When LLMs autonomously attack Opens in new window

picoCTF aims to close the cybersecurity talent gap

Energy and Innovation

CyLab researchers set to present their work at PETS 2025

CMU’s Critical Technology Institute hosts DARPA fellows Opens in new window

A cross-stack solution for energy-efficient data centers Opens in new window

CyLab to host Robotics Security and Privacy Workshop July 28-29

CyLab researchers to present at PLDI 2025

New privacy threat modeling framework takes a user-centric perspective

Poisoned datasets put AI models at risk for attack

picoCTF-Africa returns with a continent-wide training tour Opens in new window

CyLab researchers to present at USENIX PEPR 2025

Presidential and graduate fellowships announced for 2024-2025 Opens in new window

CMU hacking team wins unprecedented fourth straight title at MITRE cybersecurity competition

CMU re-designated as National Center for Academic Excellence

Cybersecurity educators should share resources to teach students important technical and non-technical skills

Purpose Mode helps social media users stay focused on their desired tasks

Space-tolerant computer chips Opens in new window

Michael Mattarock joins CMU INI as its new associate director

Protecting audio privacy at the source

CyLab researchers win Test of Time Award at USEC 2025

CyLab announces third round of Secure Blockchain Initiative funded projects

CyLab researchers present at ACM CHI 2025

picoCTF capture-the-flag competition prepares students for rewarding careers in cybersecurity

A cybersecurity question answering assistant that motivates users to follow its advice

Understanding YouTube giveaway scams: are teens more susceptible?

Moderating content for end-to-end encryption

CyLab faculty, students to present at NDSS Symposium 2025

CyLab awards 2025 seed funding

Fostering the next generation of thinkers in digital identity Opens in new window

CMU and CLP Celebrate International Data Privacy Day on January 26

Improving privacy for digital public goods Opens in new window

Student bug bounty discovery supports picoCTF’s cybersecurity education efforts with $462,000 gift

Media Mentions

Mireshghallah’s AI study featured for revealing adversarial delegation

Cranor discusses the future of login privacy and functionality

Sekar quoted on need for federal AI guardrails

Sekar quoted on social media fingerprint hacking worries

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