Sweden: PhD student in Security and Privacy of Social Networks

Application deadline: June 28, 2010
Employer's reference number: D-2010-0248

KTH The School of Computer Science and Communication (CSC) seeks a PhD student in Security and Privacy of Social Networks.

KTH is the largest technical university in Sweden. Education and research cover a broad spectrum within natural sciences and engineering, as well as architecture, industrial engineering and management, urban planning, work science and environmental engineering. KTH has 6,955 full-time equivalent students at Bachelor (first) level, 5,545 at Master (second) level, 1,314 at doctoral studies (third) level and 3,900 employees.

CSC is one of Sweden’s most advanced and successful research and education institutions in Information Technology at KTH and Stockholm University. The activities of the school focus on higher education and research within the traditional core areas of numerical analysis and computer science; from theory building and analysis of mathematical models to algorithm construction, implementation and simulation. Other core areas of growing importance are technology and methods for the support of human communication and computer mediated cooperation over distances in time and space. The applied research includes scientific computing, computer science, computer vision, robotics, neuroinformatics and neural networks, human-computer interaction, media technology and graphic arts, and communication through speech, language and music.

For more information see

• www.kth.se/csc go to"CSC International Website".

The Department of Theoretical Computer Science (TCS) offers a stimulating research environment in a range of topics such as complexity theory and approximation algorithms, computer and network security, cryptography, programming languages, and formal methods. Security and safety of computer and network based systems has been identified as an area of strategic importance.

Online Social Networks like Facebook, MySpace, Xing, etc. have become extremely popular. Yet they have some limitations that we want to overcome for a next generation of social networks: privacy concerns and requirements of Internet connectivity, both of which are due to web-based applications on a central site whose owner has access to all data. To overcome these limitations, we envision a paradigm shift from a client-server to a peer-to-peer infrastructure coupled with encryption so that users keep control of their data and can use the social network also locally, without Internet access. This shift gives rise to many research questions intersecting areas such as networking, security, distributed systems, and social network analysis - leading to a better understanding of how technology can support social interactions. For more details see the PeerSoN project page at

• http://www.peerson.net

The goal of this PhD project is to develop and evaluate security and privacy mechanisms for decentralized social networks in particular and for provider-independent personal communications in general.

The candidate will join a collaborative project with researchers located at KTH, NTU Singapore, EPFL Lausanne, and T-Labs Berlin.

This is a four-year, time-limited position and normally includes 20% departmental duties, usually teaching. Research/doctoral students must be registered at KTH. The starting date is open for discussion, though ideally we would like the successful candidate to start as soon as possible.

Employment

Form of employment: Time-limited
Work time: Full time
Start date: According to agreement
The salary follows the directions provided by KTH
Number of positions: 1

Qualifications

The applicant is expected to have a strong background and interest in computer science, including subjects such as security, cryptography, networking, distributed systems, and game theory.

Applicants must be strongly motivated for doctoral studies, possess the ability to work independently and perform critical analysis as well as possessing good levels of cooperative and communicative abilities.

To address its varied work, KTH aims to employ a diversity of talent and thus welcomes applicants who will add to the variety of the University, especially as concerns its gender structure.

Application

Application deadline: June 28, 2010
Employer's reference number: D-2010-0248

Applications should contain a letter where the applicants describe themselves, their qualifications, and interests. They should also contain a Curriculum Vitae, grade transcripts, copies of the applicant’s Master thesis and/or publications, and names and addresses of two references. Applicants about to finish their M.Sc. degrees may be considered for the position.

Applications via email to:

• susanneb@csc.kth.se

Write reference number in the email subject. (CV, etc should be sent as an attachment preferably pdf-files.)

Alternatively applications by ordinary post to be sent to:

KTH, CSC
att. Susanne Bergman
Lindstedtsvägen 3, plan 4
SE-100 44 Stockholm
Sweden

Source: KTH Website