Prof Achim D. Brucker

Chair in Cybersecurity

Telephone: 01392 724569

Extension: (Streatham) 4569

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Short Bio

Achim is a full Professor in Computer Science (Chair in Cybersecurity) and Head of the Cybersecurity Group at the University of Exeter, UK and a leading expert in secure software engineering, cybersecurity, and formal methods. He is the head of the Cybersecurity Group at Exeter and leads the Software Assurance & Security Research Team. From December 2015 to May 2019, he was a Senior Lecturer and Consultant at the Computer Science Department of The University of Sheffield, UK.

Until December 2015, Achim was a Research Expert (Architect), Security Testing Strategist, and Project Lead in the Global Security Team of SAP SE, where, among others, he defined the risk-based security testing strategy of SAP that combines static, dynamic, and interactive security testing methods and integrates them deeply into SAP’s Secure Software Development Life Cycle. He was involved in rolling out static and dynamic application security testing tools to the world-wide development organization of SAP. Moreover, he represented SAP in OCL standardization process of the OMG.

Want to Work with Me

Industry and Academic Collaborations

I am always excited to connect with new collaborators in areas of my research (e.g., cybersecurity, information security, high-integrity systems, formal methods, software development/engineering, etc.). Collaboration can range from informally to publicly (co-)funded project to direct industry engagements. Please email me to discuss details. Within the umbrella of the university, usually short term consultancy work (a few days) or long-term project (at least six months) or co-funded PhD studentships seem to work best. But other collaboration modes can also work.

Prospective PhD Students

Please see my page on PhD Supervision.

Advisory Roles

Member of the Advisory Board of Anzen Technology Systems Limited (Technology and Security Adviser).

Professional Activities and Achievements

Expert at the European Commission (EU).
Member of the EPSRC Peer Review College.
Member of the EPSRC Future Leadership Peer Review College.
Member of the Tests and Proofs (TAP) conference steering committee.
Speaker on professional security conferences such as OWASP AppSecEU.

Qualifications

Diplom (MSc) Computer Science (Major) & Microsystems Engineering (Minor), University of Freiburg, Germany
Dr. sc. ETH (PhD), ETH Zurich, Switzerland
Senior Fellow (SFHEA), AdvanceHE, UK
Full Member (MCIIS) of the Chartered Institute of Information Technology (CIISEC)
ACM Senior Member

Research

Achim’s research interests include cybersecurity, formal methods, security/safety engineering, and software engineering. His aim is to build secure, reliable, resilient software (and hardware systems). He works on using formal methods, verification, static analysis, and testing techniques both on the source and binary level as well as on the level of specifications and abstract models.

Examples of his work include the Isabelle/HOL-based tools HOL-OCL (a formal specification environment and theorem prover for UML/OCL specifications) and HOL-TestGen (a theorem prover-based testing environment), model-driven engineering tools (e.g., in the context of SecureUML and SecureBPMN), security testing, work in access control, mobile security and browser security. For a more complete overview of his research achievements, please visit his personal web page and the software assurance & security research page.

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