Bimal Viswanath

Bimal Viswanath is an Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Virginia Tech's College of Engineering. His research focuses on cybersecurity, privacy engineering, and machine learning, particularly addressing adversarial AI and ML system vulnerabilities. He holds a Ph.D. from Saarland University and Max Planck Institute for Software Systems, and has held postdoctoral positions at UCSB and Nokia Bell Labs.

Education

• Ph.D., Computer Science, Saarland University/Max Planck Institute (2016)
• M.S., Computer Science, IIT Madras (2008)
• B.Tech, Computer Science, Cochin University (2005)

Research interests include:

• Adversarial attacks using/against ML systems
• Generative AI security (deepfakes, chatbots)
• Cybersecurity for online services

Grants & Funding

Recipient of CCI, NSF, and 4-VA grants supporting projects like robust AI defense mechanisms and adversarial image classification. Recent grants include $1.2M for AI security initiatives (2022-2025).

Awards

• Distinguished Paper Award (SOUPS 2014)
• Best Paper Award (COSN 2015)
• AI2000 Most Influential Scholar Honorable Mention (2020)

Advising

Guided over 15 students including Jiameng Pu (PhD 2022), Connor Weeks (MS 2023), and current advisees Sifat Muhammad Abdullah (PhD 2021-). Notable student achievements include Facebook Fellowship nominations and industry placements at CVENT and University of Michigan.

Labs & Teams

Leading Virginia Tech's AI Security Lab focusing on generative models, adversarial ML, and applied cybersecurity solutions.