Patrick McDaniel, a professor in the Computer Science and Engineering Department at the Pennsylvania State University and co-director of the Systems and Internet Infrastructure Security Laboratory, will present “Mobile Smartphone Application Security and Privacy,” the first lecture in a series on science, technology, and the law, sponsored by Penn State Law.
The free lecture will be held from 12:30 to 2 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 17, in room 116, Lewis Katz Building, University Park and simulcast to room 114, Lewis Katz Hall, Carlisle, Pa.
“By having Penn State research scientists present their research, while paying particular attention to its practical, social and/or legal implications, we hope to increase the technical/scientific literacy of our students, help them identify legal issues raised by new technologies, and provide a forum for interdisciplinary dialogue,” said Penn State Law Professor Eileen Kane.
During his presentation, McDaniel will discuss the emerging privacy and security issues raised by mobile smartphone development, particularly in the context of open systems which invite developers and end users to build applications and modify phone behavior. Such systems are subject to novel vulnerabilities and will require an appropriate infrastructure for the analysis, configuration, and enforcement of security policy in mobile phones and the networks on which they reside.
McDaniel's research efforts centrally focus on network, telecommunications, and systems security, language-based security, and technical public policy. He is the editor in chief of "Transactions on Internet Technology" (TOIT), and serves as associate editor of the journals ACM "Transactions on Information and System Security," "IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering," and "IEEE Transactions on Computers." McDaniel was awarded the National Science Foundation CAREER Award and has chaired several top conferences in security including, among others, the 2007 and 2008 “IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy” and the 2005 “USENIX Security Symposium.”