Winter 2024/2025

Digital Entomology: Tracking and Tackling Cyber Bugs (Seminar, 3 ECTS, MSc)

Cybersecurity attacks happen frequently and have severe impact. Bugs in digital systems make these attacks possible. In this seminar, we'll take a look into these bugs, why they happen, how they can be exploited, and what could be done to mitigate them. We're collecting and studying cyber bugs – and you'll all be digital entomologists!

The seminar follows a weekly schedule. Each week, we'll talk about recent, impactful bugs. The research talks will be split into bugs presented by the lecturer as well as bugs presented by students. We aim at covering highly diverse and recent bugs and bug classes, such as:

• web and browser security,
• internet-facing services including firewalls, mail, ...,
• binary exploitation,
• real-world bugs in cryptographic implementations,
• hardware bugs,
• ...

Students can pick the bugs they present on their own, but there'll be some moderation to ensure no duplicate bugs and a high variety.

Mobile Security (Lecture Series, 6 ECTS, MSc)

This lecture covers mobile security on an application and system level, with many hands-on exercises. Students will learn state-of-the-art security concepts for both, iOS and Android, and will be able to perform security testing of mobile apps, mobile malware analysis, as well as testing security-critical components within mobile operating systems. Grading is based on exercises and the final exam.