Reinforcing Cyber-Physical Systems Security
to Combat Intelligent Aliens
Abstract
The recent advent of Artificial Intelligent (AI) and in particular machine learning has dramatically changed computer-assisted technologies in many application domains and sectors where automated decision makings are performed in accordance and help of intelligent and systematically trained AI-powered models. It is not a surprise that cyber security hackers also leverage these sophisticated AI-based technologies to craft and launch advanced and evasive cyber attacks that remain undetected and stealth during the course of cyber operations. This talk will provide a comprehensive overview of cyber attacks with special focus on Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) and Internet-of-Things (IoT). As the major theme of this talk, the AI-powered cyber attacks and their operations will also be explored. The talk will also provide the state-of-the-art of research in adapting AI-based and, in particular, Reinforcement Learning approaches in building automated defense systems to combat evasive cyber attacks.
Short Biography
Dr. Akbar Namin is a full professor in Computer Science at Texas Tech University where he directs the Center for the Science and Engineering of Cyber Security (CSECS). Namin earned his Ph.D. in Computer Science from Western University, Canada, in 2008. Namin’s research is in cyber security, machine learning, Reinforcement Learning, Large Language Models (LLM), software engineering, and human AI interactions. Namin has authored over 120 scientific papers and research articles appeared at premier professional venues and journals. Namin has been the guest editors of several scientific journals. He has founded the Advanced Socio-Technical Analytics Research Lab in Computer Science Department with over 10 Ph.D. and 80 Master’s students graduated. His research lab conducts multidisciplinary research projects in various areas including human factors in cyber security and humanized AI through Reinforcement Learning. The National Science Foundation (NSF) and The Office of Navy Research (ONR) fund his scholarly work in cyber security research and education. Namin is a Fulbright U.S. scholar visiting the St. Polten University of Applied Sciences, Department of Computer and Security, Austria, in 2025.
