iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Dan York @danyork.bsky.social · 20/04/2026

Very interesting and useful paper on a critically important topic ... what happens to all our digital assets when we die? How are we setting up our estate plans / wills to ensure our heirs can access our info? Something I don't think we collectively pay enough attention to... #Death #Internet

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 14/04/2026

My student Jenny Tang just presented our work at #chi26. We have been interested in post-mortem management of online accounts (1/5) andrew.cmu.edu/user/nicolas...

andrew.cmu.edu

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 20/10/2025

Last week my student Ally Nisenoff published "Exploiting the Shared Storage API" at @acm_ccs: www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/nicolas... 3 days later, Google announced they're abandoning Shared Storage: privacysandbox.com/news/update-... (Correlation doesn't imply causation. Interesting, though.)

andrew.cmu.edu

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 11/09/2025

We're hosting the 7th intl' conf. on Advances in Financial Technologies (AFT'25) at Carnegie Mellon on Oct. 8-10. Join us to hear about the latest exciting developments in crypto research. Registration closes on Sept 16! advfintech.org/aft25/attend... (Program: advfintech.org/aft25/progra...)

advfintech.org

Advances in Financial Technologies

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 15/08/2025

That’s a wrap for me at #usesec25 Conferences should really consider reusing the tag holders, the amount of wasted plastic is staggering

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 15/08/2025

“Canadian pharmacist helps run notorious deepfake porn site.” The online crime jokes write themselves.

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Wentao Guo @wentaoguo.bsky.social · 13/08/2025

I'm presenting my USENIX paper "How Researchers De-Identify Data in Practice" at 9am this Thursday. Kudos to my co-authors Paige Pepitone, @adamaviv.bsky.social, and @mmazurek.bsky.social. Come say hi—I am on the academic job market! Here's the paper: www.usenix.org/conference/u... #usesec25

Poster for our paper "How Researchers De-Identify Data in Practice"

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 13/08/2025

Taro just presented this at #usesec25, and will be manning the poster shortly. If you are around we would love to hear from you.

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 13/08/2025

I’m not sure there is a more clichéed Seattle experience than having a latte at a local coffee shop with some salmon on toast while they’re blaring Soundgarden’s “Outshined.”

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 12/08/2025

My student Jenny Tang (coadvised with @lujobauer.bsky.social) is making friends at SOUPS with our paper on looking at 10 years of SOUPS papers and reviewing how solid the stats were. Basically: not great, not great at all. (And that includes my own work.) Paper: www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/nicolas...

andrew.cmu.edu

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 21/07/2025

New research alert 🚨 from my group, “Blockchain Address Poisoning” (Tsuchiya et al.), to appear at USENIX Security 2025 (arxiv.org/abs/2501.16681)! As a follow-up, we also developed a real-time detection system: cryptotrade.cylab.cmu.edu/poisoning/ and x.com/toxin_tagger (1/7)

arxiv.org

Blockchain Address Poisoning

In many blockchains, e.g., Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain (BSC), the primary representation used for wallet addresses is a hardly memorable 40-digit hexadecimal string. As a result, users often select ...

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Mike Wiser @drmikewiser.bsky.social · 17/06/2025

Just because your prof didn't file an academic dishonesty report does not mean that they don't know you cheated. Knowing you did it and proving it to the hearing board are two different thresholds.

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

PSA: If you're using homebrew, and discovered that MAME crashes w/ a Bus Error upon startup after upgrading to Sequoia, 1) update mame.ini so that the line containing gl_lib points to /System/Library/Frameworks/OpenGL.framework/Libraries/libGLVMPlugin.dylib 2) launch w/ DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH="" mame

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 09/06/2025

🧵 about a new paper by my amazing students and collaborators. To appear this week at SIGMETRICS. 👇

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Carnegie Mellon University @cmu.edu · 06/06/2025

CMU researchers are using personalized models to decode how cancer behaves in individual patients, one of medicine's toughest challenges. Through individualized data and insights, their work revealed hidden #cancer subtypes that could inform treatment and improve survival predictions. #Research

cmu.edu

CMU Researchers Build Personalized Models To Advance Precision Cancer Care

Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Computer Science developed a new approach to bridge this gap between available data and actionable insight, creating personalized models to help...

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 28/05/2025

Looking for a home for your great scientific result in fintech that is almost all written up and ready to go? The AFT deadline is in less than 24 hours… aftconf.github.io/aft25/index....

aftconf.github.io

Advances in Financial Technologies

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Serge Egelman @v0max.bsky.social · 25/05/2025

Pasta sauce cookie is something you should only attempt after you’ve gotten your second Michelin star. Like, David Chang, I’d eat his pasta sauce cookie no questions. Doing it myself because the teevee told me to, yeah, no.

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Eileen Clancy 🧿 @clancyny.bsky.social · 24/05/2025

In NYC, a man was tortured for two weeks for Bitcoin. He escaped. Alice Hutchings @message4bob.bsky.social and colleagues tell us it's happening around the world. Conference paper: "Investigating Wrench Attacks: Physical Attacks: Targeting Cryptocurrency Users" drops.dagstuhl.de/storage/00li...

Investigating Wrench Attacks: Physical Attacks
Targeting Cryptocurrency Users

Marilyne Ordekian #
Department of Computer Science, University College London, UK

Gilberto Atondo-Siu #
Department of Computer Science, University of Cambridge, UK

Alice Hutchings #
Department of Computer Science, University of Cambridge, UK

Marie Vasek #
Department of Computer Science, University College London, UK

Abstract

Cryptocurrency wrench attacks are physical attacks targeting cryptocurrency users in the real world to illegally obtain cryptocurrencies. These attacks significantly undermine the efficacy of existing digital security norms when confronted with real-world threats. We present the first comprehensive
study on wrench attacks. We propose a theoretical approach to defining wrench attacks per criminal law norms, and an interdisciplinary empirical approach to measure their incidence. Leveraging three data sources, we perform crime script analysis, detecting incidents globally across 10 interviews with victims and experts, 146 news articles, and 37 online forums. Our findings reveal diverse groups

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Ben Waber @bwaber.bsky.social · 06/05/2025

Next was an intriguing talk by McKenna McCall on the need to combine formal methods and usable security approaches at @cmus3d.bsky.social www.youtube.com/watch?v=qbnq... (5/7)

youtube.com

Current Topics in Privacy-January 21st 2025-McKenna McCall

YouTube video by Carnegie Mellon Software and Societal Systems Dept

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Patrick Park @patpark.bsky.social · 18/05/2025

These talented young musicians teamed up to bring the joy of music to young children in the community. Please support their cause. 6pm (CT) tonight at Nichols Hall, Evanston. Please join us in person or through the live stream. youtube.com/live/MxXwBr_...

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Pittsburgh Scanner @pgh-scanner.com · 11/05/2025

Lawrenceville. 44th Street. If you accidentally left your rooster in your locked car, PD is about to break your window.

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Rua M. Williams @fractalecho.bsky.social · 03/05/2025

If you're a grad student or an undergrad interested in research I need to you listen to me very carefully. You cannot learn to write good research papers if you do not read good research papers. Stop asking LLMs to summarize papers for you.

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Steve Rathje @steverathje.bsky.social · 10/04/2025

I'm thrilled to announce that I'll be joining Carnegie Mellon as an Assistant Professor of Human-Computer Interaction (with a courtesy joint appointment in Social and Decision Sciences) in 2026!

Steve Rathje wearing a Carnegie Mellon sweatshirt

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Frederic Jacobs @fredericjacobs.com · 21/03/2025

🔐✌️ Victory for Privacy and Security in France 🇫🇷 End-to-end encryption will continue to be available in France, as the assembly overwhelmingly voted against an amendment to legislation fighting drug trafficking which required backdoors in encrypted messengers. www.lemonde.fr/societe/arti...

lemonde.fr

L’Assemblée nationale vote pour le maintien de la confidentialité des messageries cryptées, lors d’une nuit agitée

Malgré une panne du système de vote, les députés ont repoussé, jeudi, la mesure défendue par le ministre de l’intérieur, Bruno Retailleau, qui aurait permis aux services de renseignement d’accéder aux...

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Steve Syfuhs @syfuhs.net · 18/03/2025

What, no? I mean, probably not. Well, it shouldn't. Look, I'm not going to find out, but yes probably. Amusingly, I think it was written by one of our VPs who just retired.

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Steve Syfuhs @syfuhs.net · 17/03/2025

Q: Why is the code doing this thing? A: oh...oh no

New for Win95, allows a caller to determine what...

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

David Andersen @daveandersen.bsky.social · 17/03/2025

Watching Ben Titzer give a warning parable about the Lamputer (the trend towards making everything programmable) and realizing I used a raspberry pi pico as a dumb on/off light switch for my closet lights and I am part of the problem.

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 12/03/2025

A clear sign of the impending apocalypse is that the @nytimes.com spelling bee featured the letter that shall not be named today.

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 03/03/2025

It is an absolute scandal that “gianduja” isn’t accepted as a pangram in the @nytimes.com spelling bee today. What kind of Mickey Mouse operation doesn’t know about Nutella? I shall cancel my subscription.

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Delbert Grady Seasons @delbertgseasons.bsky.social · 25/02/2025

I don’t know if Google can top this, their finest work to date

Google
is tripe kosher
All
Images
Videos
Shopping
Forums
News
Al Overview
Learn more :
Whether tripe is kosher depends on the religion of the cow. Kosher meat can be ordered online, including kosher beef tripe. ~
Generative Al is experimental.

170110103192

Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 22/02/2025

I am not going to NDSS this year but we have some great students attending. Is anybody among the people I know here going, so that I can make introductions?

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

"Oh, but I've been so busy" is prof-speak for "I am so utterly useless at time management that I would be irremediably unemployable in any other line of work." Please don't use that sorry excuse, get better, and tend to your commitments on time. Thank you.

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Destenie Nock, PhD @destenie.bsky.social · 01/02/2025

Last week the sound of a pipe bursting somewhere inside my wall, followed by a geyser of water gushing from my kitchen cabinet, interrupted my work calls. The culprit: -5 temperatures in Pittsburgh. Cost of repairs are $950 and counting, just for the pipes. #EnergySky triblive.com/opinion/dest...

triblive.com

Destenie Nock: Help is out there for those struggling with heating costs

The sound of a pipe bursting somewhere inside my wall, followed by a torrent of water gushing from my kitchen cabinet, interrupted one of my work calls a week ago. The culprit: freezing temperatures i...

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Nicolas Christin @nc2y.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

Testing DeepSeek on a local machine, it does seem it has some information controls built in. It for instance does not answer questions about June 4, 1989.

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Christina Areizaga Barbieri, Ph.D. @cabarbieri.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

I’m an NSF panel reviewer that was scheduled to meet today. Just got notice that all NSF panels were canceled today. I reviewed some innovative proposals in support of students. Devastating if these scholars don’t get to do this work. For the love of science & students I hope this is just a delay.💔

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Lenore Blum @lenoreblum.bsky.social · 25/01/2025

Super congratulations @clegoues.bsky.social!👏🥳

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Dr. Claire Le Goues @clegoues.bsky.social · 24/01/2025

In professional news: one of the things Biden signed his last week of office was a recognition of a set of PECASE awardees. Unbelievably honored (not to mention completely dumbfounded) to have been included on that list. 1/ www.cmu.edu/news/stories...

cmu.edu

CMU Researchers Receive Presidential Early Career Awards

Carnegie Mellon University's Ismaila Dabo, Claire Le Goues and Aaditya Ramdas are among the recipients of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), the highest accolad...

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

Andy Greenberg @agreenberg.bsky.social · 22/01/2025

For anyone feeling nostalgic on the occasion of Ross Ulbricht's pardon, here's my interview with him (as the Dread Pirate Roberts) from 2013, just a few months before his arrest: www.forbes.com/sites/andygr...

forbes.com

An Interview With A Digital Drug Lord: The Silk Road's Dread Pirate Roberts (Q&A)

Most black market drug lords don't give interviews. But the Dread Pirate Roberts isn't most drug lords. His website, the Silk Road, is designed to allow anyone to buy and sell drugs with the crypto-cu...

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Reposted by Nicolas Christin

David Andersen @daveandersen.bsky.social · 20/01/2025

PSA: the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh's website is lying today. 🤣 But hey we had a nice walk.

Screenshot showing the main branch with hours and "building open today" (the building was not open today)

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