Associate Professor · CMU HCII
Human-centered security, privacy, AI
Security, Privacy, Usability and Design Lab · Carnegie Mellon HCII
I design systems that give people more agency over their personal data and experiences online.
I am an Associate Professor (without indefinite tenure) at
Carnegie Mellon University's
Human-Computer Interaction Institute.
I am also co-founder and Chief Technology Officer of
FuguUX,
an early-stage start-up dedicated to improving web usability.
At CMU, I direct the
SPUD (Security, Privacy, Usability and Design) Lab.
We work at the intersection of HCI, AI and cybersecurity/privacy.
Some key research directions include:
AI Privacy for Practitioners
Human-AI Teaming for Usable S&P
Evaluating Language Model Privacy
Human-centered Adversarial ML
Privacy Collective Action & Governance
Physically-intuitive Privacy and Security
Social Cybersecurity
Venue abbreviations
BP = Best Paper · HM = Best Paper Honorable Mention · DP = Distinguished Paper
Not recruiting · 2026–27 cycle
Prospective Ph.D. Students
While I do not plan on accepting any new students at this time, I encourage you to apply to the HCII Ph.D. program at CMU to work with my fantastic colleagues.
What you can do instead — I'm a…
- Apply to the HCII Ph.D. program — you can work with my fantastic colleagues, and lab collaborations often cross advisors.
- Watch my advice for Ph.D. applicants before you write your statement.
- Follow me on Bluesky — I'll post there when my recruiting status changes for future cycles.
- Email me about collaborations or research questions — those are always welcome, and don't depend on the recruiting cycle.
- Skim the research directions above to find overlap before reaching out.
- Visiting or press? Email me with dates and context and I'll route it.
Last updated April 2026
Students
The people who do the work in the SPUD Lab — current and former.
Publications
69 papers, 2011–2026.