Yinzhi Cao

Yinzhi Cao is an Associate Professor at the Johns Hopkins University Department of Computer Science. He serves as Technical Director of the Johns Hopkins Information Security Institute and is affiliated with the Data Science and Artificial Intelligence Institute and the Institute for Assured Autonomy. Cao joined JHU in 2018 from Lehigh University, where he was an Assistant Professor.

• Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Computer Science, Northwestern University (2014)
• Bachelor of Engineering (BE) in Electronic Engineering, Tsinghua University (2008)

Research Interests focus on security and privacy of web, mobile, and machine learning systems. Key projects include Vulnerability Analysis of Web Applications and Security, Privacy, and Fairness Analysis of ML Systems. His work addresses prototype pollution in JavaScript, node.js vulnerabilities, browser fingerprinting, federated learning privacy, and automated exploit generation.

Scientific Recognition includes the

• NSF CAREER Award (2021)
• DARPA Young Faculty Award (2022) & Director's Fellowship (2024)
• Amazon Research Awards (2022, 2017)
• IEEE Security & Privacy Test of Time Award (2025)
• Distinguished Paper Awards at IEEE S&P 2025, CCS 2023, USENIX Security 2022

Advising & Grants highlight mentorship of 20+ PhD and Master’s students across institutions. Major grants include

• $1.2M collaborative CICI TCR grant (2024-2026) with Dr. John Aucott
• $750K DARPA YFA grant (2022-2025)
• $500K NSF SaTC grant (2022-2025)
• NSF EAGER grant (2016-2017)

Labs & Teams: Affiliated with Johns Hopkins Information Security Institute, Data Science AI Institute, and Institute for Assured Autonomy. Collaborates with institutions like Columbia, UC Santa Barbara, and SRI International. His group investigates real-world vulnerabilities in over 2,500 websites and NPM packages, uncovering 80+ zero-day issues.