NYU Tandon goes on the offensive against deep fakes, cyber stalking, online harassment & 3D printer counterfeiting

The rise of AI has amplified the need for responsible stewardship of new technologies, ushering in challenges that require engineers' expertise to solve.

NYU Tandon School of Engineering researchers are doing just that, with the support of Google’s Cyber NYC Institutional Research Program (IRP). In June 2023, Google allocated a total of $12 million through Cyber NYC IRP, funding cybersecurity training, education, and cutting-edge research at NYU, City University of New York, Columbia University, and Cornell Tech. 

The NYU Center for Cybersecurity (CCS) at NYU Tandon determined the allocation of funds for NYU’s faculty-led research projects.

In its first year, NYU Tandon unveiled a slate of projects under the Google Cyber NYC IRP research umbrella, intended to help safeguard people from potential risks – from online harassment to deep fake manipulations – and build trust in the novel innovations that power industries and shape people’s lives.

"Our vision with our Google Cyber NYC IRP research roster is to foster a dynamic ecosystem that balances ambitious, long-term explorations with targeted, practical studies,” said Eray Aydil, Senior Vice Dean of NYU Tandon. “We actively encouraged interdisciplinary collaborations across departments, universities, and research organizations to leverage diverse expertise in tackling complex challenges from multiple angles."

Google Cyber NYC IRP’s target research areas this year are Trusted Computing, Trustworthy AI, AI for Cybersecurity Defense, and Human and Social Sciences. 

Researchers at NYU Tandon working in the Human and Social Sciences category are:

• Chinmay Hegde, associate professor in NYU Tandon Computer Science and Engineering (CSE) and Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) departments, who is developing an interactive system that issues intelligent challenges to differentiate real from deepfake audio and videos during live calls. This system, based on a ‘challenge-response’ approach, arms people with tools to avoid scams and other duplicitous acts. Hegde and colleagues have published two papers that introduce and validate new techniques for real-time detection of deepfake audio and video.
  • Project title: Real-Time Deepfake Detection: Interactive, Multimodal, and Future-Proof. 

• Danny Y. Huang, NYU Tandon assistant professor of ECE and faculty member of CCS, who is leading a research effort to create user-friendly tools for detecting and locating hidden smart devices like cameras and trackers that may be used by abusive ex-partners to harass or spy on individuals. This project aims to empower survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV) by providing them with tools to safeguard their privacy. The research team developed a prototype tool that can discover hidden IoT cameras, and presented their findings at the USENIX Security Poster Session in August 2024.
  • Project Title: Discovering & Locating Unwanted IoT Devices for Survivors of Intimate Partner Violence

• Rachel Greenstadt and Damon McCoy, NYU Tandon professors of CSE and CCS faculty members, who are undertaking initiatives to combat online harassment, by understanding user experiences and designing effective reporting systems that can effectively identify and mitigate online abuse without infringing on free speech. Their research has involved studying the deepfake creation community and the long-term harassment mechanisms in online communities. They are currently conducting studies on user experiences with harassment reporting tools, with plans to develop and test novel interaction tools in the next phase of the project.
  • Project Title: Constructive Responses to Harassment

NYU Tandon researchers are also part of Google Cyber NYC IRP’s  Trusted Computing category:

• Brandon Reagen, NYU Tandon assistant professor of ECE and faculty member of CCS, and Siddharth Garg, NYU Tandon institute associate professor of ECE and faculty member of NYU WIRELESS, are making it much easier for people to trust AI, with a cryptographic proof system. They are developing a scalable Zero-knowledge Proof (ZKP) system that allows for verifying AI behavior according to its specifications, without revealing proprietary details of the AI model itself. Their efforts have led to the creation of the SZKP architecture, which significantly accelerates ZKP generation in hardware. This work was recently published in a paper at the PACT 2024 conference.
  • Project title: Zero-Knowledge SNARKs: New schemes and applications. 

The following projects, in addition to being funded by Google Cyber NYC IRP, secured funds from NYU Tandon’s Center for Advanced Technology and Communications:

• Nikhil Gupta, NYU Tandon professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Civil and Urban Engineering, and a faculty member of CCS,  is developing a "fingerprinting" method that identifies a manufactured part by its producer, a critical first step in helping companies avoid the risk of theft and counterfeiting of intellectual property for parts that are made with 3D printing techniques.
  • Project Title: Robust Watermarking of Design Files for Security in High Quality Digital Manufacturing

• Farshad Khorrami, NYU Tandon professor of ECE, is working on a tool called SMEET that turns complex robotics and control systems' software back into understandable math formulas. If SMEET works well, it could make it much easier for people to trust the software that runs robots and control systems because they can see the math behind the software is correct. 
  • Project Title: Transformer-Based Translation from Robotics/Controls Binaries to Mathematical Expressions

Along with the projects above, Quanyan Zhu, NYU Tandon associate ECE professor and CCS faculty member, is fostering collaborative cybersecurity research environments and nurturing emerging talent.  He organized events like the NYC Cybersecurity Day Workshop which focused on the human elements in cybersecurity, and the upcoming Workshop on Large Language Models for Network Security. Zhu’s work aligns with the  Cyber NYC IRP’s goal of expanding educational opportunities for students seeking advanced degrees in cybersecurity, while also advancing research and mentoring the next generation of cybersecurity professionals.  

Joining the NYU Tandon researchers are faculty at NYU's Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, who are also conducting Google Cyber NYC IRP research projects funded via CCS’ call for proposals. 

In year two, the Cyber NYC IRP aims to continue its focus on collaborative research in Privacy, Security, and Safety. NYU’s Center for Cybersecurity has once again issued a school-wide Call for Proposals, inviting faculty to submit their research ideas.