PhD student position in Information Security

Information about the division
The Department of Computer Science and Engineering has about 70 faculty members and enrols about 90 PhD students from more than 30 countries. The research spans the whole spectrum, from theoretical foundations to applied systems development. There is extensive national and international collaboration with academia and industry all around the world. For more information, see http://www.chalmers.se/cse/EN/.

The PhD student will join the Chalmers Information Security group, working in the area of information and communication security with a focus on authentication problems in constrained settings. This is particularly important for applications involving mobile phones, wireless communication and RFID systems, which suffer from restrictions in terms of power resources, network connectivity, computational capabilities, as well as potential privacy issues. The overall aim of the announced PhD position will be to develop nearly optimal algorithms for achieving security and privacy while minimising resource use.

Major responsibilities
We are looking for an excellent PhD candidate to work in the area of information and communication security with a focus on authentication problems in constrained settings. This is particularly important for applications involving mobile phones, wireless communication and RFID systems, which suffer from restrictions in terms of power resources, network connectivity, computational capabilities, as well as potential privacy issues. The overall aim of the project will be to develop nearly optimal algorithms for achieving security and privacy while minimising resource use.

More concretely, part of the research will involve the analysis and development  of authentication protocols in specific settings. This will include investigating resistance of both existing and novel protocols against different types of attacks, theoretically and experimentally. In addition to investigating established settings, such as RFID authentication, the research will also explore more general authentication problems, such as those that arise in the context of trust in social networks, smartphone applications and collaborative data processing. This will be done by grounding the work in a generalised decision-making framework. The project should result in the development of theory and authentication mechanisms for noisy, constrained settings that strike an optimal balance between reliable authentication, privacy-preservation and resource consumption.

The PhD student will be supervised by Prof. Katerina Mitrokotsa and will have the chance to collaborate with well-known researchers in the area of information security. Some previous research related to this research project can be found here: http://www.cse.chalmers.se/~aikmitr/. Katerina Mitrokotsa's research is currently funded by the European Commission and the Chalmers ICT Areas of advance.

Details about Employment
Salary for the position is as specified in Chalmers' general agreement for PhD student positions.  Currently the starting salary is 26,250SEK a month before tax. The position is intended to start as soon as possible.

The position include 20 per cent deparmental work, mostly teaching duties.

Position summary
Full-time temporary employment. The position is limited to a maximum of five years.

Qualifications
To qualify as a PhD student, you must have a master's level degree corresponding to at least 240 higher education credits in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or in a related discipline.  As for all PhD studies, a genuine interest and curiosity in the subject matter and excellent analytical and communication skills, both oral and written, are needed.

Experience in one or more of cryptography, probability and statistics, decision and game theory are beneficial. Mathematical maturity is essential.

You may apply even if you have not completed your degree, but expect to do so before the position starts.  Knowledge of Swedish is not a prerequisite for applying since English is our working language for research, and we publish internationally.  Both Swedish and English are used in undergraduate courses. Half of our researchers and PhD students at the department come from more than 30 different countries. 

Application procedure
The application should be marked with Ref 20140054 and written in English. The application should be sent electronically via Chalmers webpage.

Application deadline: March 31, 2014 or until the position is filled so please register your application today.

For questions, please contact:
Assistant Professor, Katerina Mitrokotsa, Network and Systems, aikaterini.mitrokotsa@chalmers.se,+46 31-772 1040



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