The schedule is tentative and subject to change! Always check the assignments the week before each class.

Date	Details
09/02	Orientation and logistics
	Review assignment: • None! Please make sure to attend class, as important logistics will be discussed! Suggested reading: • Introduction to Information Assurance
09/4	Overview of USENIX Security'25
	Review assignment (optional): • Pick a paper from USENIX Security'25 program and submit a review. We will be overviewing the program. Make sure to follow the suggested review format.
09/09	Essential Crypto
	Review assignment: • None! You can work on your project proposals!
09/11	Essential Crypto (Continued)
	Review assignment: • None! You can work on your project proposals! Homework 1 released after class. Due in two weeks!
09/16	Anonymous Communications
	Review assignment (pick one for each session; the order of papers is arbitrary!): • Locating Hidden Servers • Nymble: Blocking Misbehaving Users in Anonymizing Networks • RAPTOR: Routing Attacks on Privacy in Tor • Dissent: Accountable Anonymous Group Messaging Other useful resources: • Original Tor Design • A decent collection of anonymity-related papers
09/18	Anonymous Communications (Continued)
	Pick another paper from last class (above) and review!
09/23	Project Proposal Day
	Tasks: • Introduce your project in class in 2-3 minutes to get feedback and suggestion from others. • Submit your 1-page project proposal on Canvas (by 09/30)
09/25	Censorship, Surveillance, and Wiretapping
	Review assignment: • MassBrowser: Unblocking the Censored Web for the Masses, by the Masses • The Parrot is Dead: Observing Unobservable Network Communications • The Waterfall of Liberty: Decoy Routing Circumvention that Resists Routing Attacks
09/30	Censorship, Surveillance, and Wiretapping (continued)
	Review assignment: • How the Great Firewall of China Detects and Blocks Fully Encrypted Traffic • How China Detects and Blocks Shadowsocks • Quack: Scalable Remote Measurement of Application-Layer Censorship • Additional resource: A decent collection of censorship papers Homework 2 released after class. Due in two weeks!
10/02	Data Privacy
	Review assignment: • BLENDER: Enabling Local Search with a Hybrid Differential Privacy Model • Private Information Retrieval • Quantifying Location Privacy
10/07	Privacy Leakage in Machine Learning
	Review assignment: • Membership Inference Attacks Against Machine Learning Models • Model Inversion Attacks that Exploit Confidence Information and Basic Countermeasures • Stealing Machine Learning Models via Prediction APIs Optional reading: • Privacy Risk in Machine Learning: Analyzing the Connection to Overfitting • Machine Learning with Membership Privacy using Adversarial Regularization • MemGuard: Defending against Black-Box Membership Inference Attacks via Adversarial Examples
10/09	Machine Learning Security
	Review assignment: • Stealing the Decoding Algorithms of Language Models • Manipulating Machine Learning: Poisoning Attacks and Countermeasures for Regression Learning • DeepXplore: Automated Whitebox Testing of Deep Learning Systems • Machine Learning Models that Remember Too Much Optional reading: • Certified Robustness to Adversarial Examples with Differential Privacy
10/14	Trustworthy Federated Learning
	Review assignment: • Comprehensive Privacy Analysis of Deep Learning: Stand-alone and Federated Learning under Passive and Active White-box Inference Attacks • How To Backdoor Federated Learning • Back to the Drawing Board: A Critical Evaluation of Poisoning Attacks on Production Federated Learning • Ditto: Fair and Robust Federated Learning Through Personalization Homework 3 released after class. Due in two weeks!
10/16	Bitcoin and Blockchain
	Review assignment: • None!
10/21	Bitcoin and Blockchain (Continued)
	Review assignment: • Hijacking Bitcoin: Routing Attacks on Cryptocurrencies • Eclipse Attacks on Bitcoin’s Peer-to-Peer Network • Catena: Efficient Non-equivocation via Bitcoin
10/23	Intrusion Detection
	Review assignment: • BotMiner: Clustering Analysis of Network Traffic for Protocol- and Structure-Independent Botnet Detection • Outside the Closed World: On Using Machine Learning For Network Intrusion Detection • Kitsune: An Ensemble of Autoencoders for Online Network Intrusion Detection • DeepCorr: Strong Flow Correlation Attacks on Tor Using Deep Learning • Fingerprinting Electronic Control Units for Vehicle Intrusion Detection
10/28	Covert Channels + Side-Channel Attacks
	Review assignment: • Side-Channel Leaks in Web Applications: a Reality Today, a Challenge Tomorrow • Hello from the Other Side: SSH over Robust Cache Covert Channels in the Cloud • Exploiting a Thermal Side Channel for Power Attacks in Multi-Tenant Data Centers
10/30	IoT/Embedded Systems Security
	Review assignment: • From the Aether to the Ethernet—Attacking the Internet using Broadcast Digital Television • Understanding the Mirai Botnet • Experimental Security Analysis of a Modern Automobile • Security Analysis of Emerging Smart Home Applications
11/04	No class (Election Holiday)

11/06	Malware
	Review assignment: • Data Breaches, Phishing, or Malware? Understanding the Risks of Stolen Credentials • MAMADROID: Detecting Android Malware by Building Markov Chains of Behavioral Models • Sunrise to Sunset: Analyzing the End-to-end Life Cycle and Effectiveness of Phishing Attacks at Scale • Click Trajectories: End-to-End Analysis of the Spam Value Chain
11/11	No class (Veterans' Holiday)

11/13	TBD (Amir Traveling)

11/18	Online Social Networks
	Review assignment: • Social Networking with Frientegrity: Privacy and Integrity with an Untrusted Provider • Detecting Fake Accounts in Online Social Networks at the Time of Registrations • Automated Crowdturfing Attacks and Defenses in Online Review Systems Optional reading: • Investigating Ad Transparency Mechanisms in Social Media: A Case Study of Facebook’s Explanations
11/20	Overview of other topics

11/25	Final Project Presentations

11/27	Thanksgiving Holiday

12/02	Final Project Presentations

12/04	Final Project Presentations

12/09	Final Project Presentations

COMPSCI 660: Advanced Information Assurance (Fall'25)