Marc Juarez

News: I am now a Lecturer in Cyber Security and Privacy at the University of EdinburghNew website

Currently I am a Ph.D. student in COSIC (COmputer Security and Industrial Cryptography) at KU Leuven, Belgium. Within COSIC, I am part of the Privacy Technologies group. I am fortunate to be advised by Prof. Claudia Diaz. Since 2015 my research is generously supported by a grant from the Fund for Scientific Research - Flanders (FWO) for the project: "Efficient Traffic Analysis Defenses for Low-Latency Anonymous Communications".

In 2013, I graduated with a double degree on Pure Mathematics and Computer Science Engineering at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona with a master thesis on Privacy and AI. I worked on the thesis as a software engineer intern in the IIIA-CSIC, under the superivsion of Vicenç Torra and Guillermo Navarro.

My research interests fall in the intersection between privacy, network security and artificial intelligence. In my thesis I study how to construct protocols resistant to traffic analysis and, in particular, website fingerprinting.

Email: <name> dot <surname> at kuleuven dot be

Ref list: [google scholar]

PGP key: E941794F

Github: mjuarezm

Resume: last update 03/2019

Publications

Deep fingerprinting: Undermining website fingerprinting defenses with deep learning
P. Sirinam, M. Imani, M. Juarez, M. Wright
published in CCS, 2018.
Finalist CCS'18 (paper awards), 2018.
[pdf] [src]
Inside Job: Applying Traffic Analysis to Measure Tor from Within
R. Jansen, M. Juarez, R. Galvez, T. Elahi, C. Diaz
In the Network and Distributed System Security Symposium (NDSS). The Internet Society, 2018.
[pdf] [src]
Automated Feature Extraction for Website Fingerprinting through Deep Learning
V. Rimmer, D. Preuveneers, M. Juarez, T. Van Goethem, W. Joosen
In the Network and Distributed System Security Symposium (NDSS). The Internet Society, 2018.
[pdf] [site] [src]
How Unique is Your .onion? An Analysis of the Fingerprintability of Tor Onion Services
R. Overdorf, M. Juarez, G. Acar, R. Greenstadt, C. Diaz
In the ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS), pp. 2021-2036. ACM, 2017.
Finalist Caspar Bowden Award in PETS 2018.
Finalist CCS'17 (paper awards), 2017.
[pdf] [site] [src]
Website Fingerprinting Defenses at the Application Layer
G. Cherubin, J. Hayes, M. Juarez
In the Privacy Enhancing Technologies Symposium (PETS), 2017.
[pdf] [site] [src] [blog post]
Toward an Efficient Website Fingerprinting Defense
M. Juarez, M. Imani, M. Perry, C. Diaz, M. Wright
In the European Symposium on Research in Computer Security (ESORICS), pp. 20, Springer, 2016.
won the ESORICS Outstanding Paper Award
[pdf] [bib] [src]
A Critical Analysis of Website Fingerprinting Attacks
M. Juarez, S. Afroz, G. Acar, C. Diaz, R. Greenstadt
In ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS), pp. 263-274, ACM, 2014.
[pdf] [bib] [src]
The Web never forgets: Persistent tracking mechanisms in the wild
G. Acar, C. Eubank, S. Englehardt, M. Juarez, A. Narayanan, and C. Diaz
In ACM conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS), pp. 674-689, ACM, 2014.
[pdf] [bib] [website] [src]
FPDetective: Dusting the Web for Fingerprinters
G. Acar, M. Juarez, N. Nikiforakis, C. Diaz, S. Gürses, F. Piessens and B. Preneel
In ACM conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS), pp. 1129-1140, ACM, 2013.
[pdf] [bib] [website] [src]
DisPA: an Intelligent Agent for Private Web Search
M. Juarez, V. Torra
Advanced Research in Data Privacy, Studies in Computational Intelligence, vol. 567, pp. 389-405, Springer, 2015.
[pdf] [bib]
A Self-Adaptive Classification for the Dissociating Privacy Agent
M. Juarez, V. Torra
In the annual conference on Privacy, Security and Trust (PST), pp. 44-50, IEEE, 2013.
[pdf] [bib] [src]
Toward a Privacy Agent for Information Retrieval
M. Juarez, V. Torra
International Journal of Intelligent Systems, ch. 28 (6), pp. 606-622, Wiley, 2013.
[pdf] [bib] [src]

(name in bold indicates first or shared first author)

Workshops

DNS Privacy not so private: the traffic analysis perspective
S. Siby, M. Juarez, N. Vallina-Rodriguez, and C. Troncoso
in HOTPETS, 2018.
[pdf]
Poster: Transparency into the Causes of Website Inaccessibility
S. Afroz, H. Chen, M. Javed, M. Juarez, V. Paxson, S. A. Qazi, S. Sajid, M. C. Tschantz
Poster in OPERANDI Workshop (co-located with PETS'18) (NDSS), 2018.
[pdf] [poster]
On the Application of Deep Learning Techniques to Website Fingerprinting Attacks and Defenses
M. Juarez and V. Rimmer
Deep Learning Security Workshop (Research Forum), 5 pages, 2017.
award for the presentation
[pdf]
Poster: Fingerprinting hidden service circuits from a Tor middle relay
M. Juarez, T. Elahi, R. Jansen, C. Diaz, R. Galvez, M. Wright
Poster in the IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (S&P), 2017.
[pdf] [poster]
Profiling Tor Users with Unsupervised Learning Techniques
R. Galvez, M. Juarez, C. Diaz
International Workshop on Inference and Privacy in a Hyperconnected World (INFER), 2016..
[pdf] [bib]

Conferences / Workshops / Courses attended

19th Privacy Enhancing Technologies Symposium (PETS 2019)
16th-20th July, 2019
KTH, Stockholm, Sweden
12th International Conference on Computers, Privacy and Data Protection (CPDP2019)
January, 2019
in Les Halles, Brussels, Belgium
18th Privacy Enhancing Technologies Symposium (PETS 2018)
24th-27th July, 2018
CCCB, Barcelona, Spain
2018 Tor dev meeting
10th - 18th March 2018
Rome, Italy
a href="https://www.ndss-symposium.org/ndss2018/">2017 NDSS Symposium)
18-21 February, 2018
Catamaran Resort Hotel and Spa in San Diego, CA, USA
11th International Conference on Computers, Privacy and Data Protection (CPDP2018)
January, 2018
in Les Halles, Brussels, Belgium
24th ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS2017)
October 30th - November 3rd, 2017
in Dallas, TX, USA
17th Privacy Enhancing Technologies Symposium (PETS 2017)
18th - 21st July
University of Minesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA
38th IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (SP 2017)
May 22-24, 2017
Fairmont Hotel in San Jose, CA, USA
2017 Tor dev meeting
22th - 27th March 2017
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
10th International Conference on Computers, Privacy and Data Protection (CPDP2017)
The age of intelligent machines
25th - 27th January, 2017
in Les Halles, Brussels, Belgium
21st European Symposium on Research in Computer Security (ESORICS 2016)
September 26-27, 2016
Heraklion, Crete, Greece
Modeling Decisions for Artificial Intelligence 2016 (MDAI)
19th-21st September, 2016
in the Universitat d'Andorra, Sant Julià de Lòria, Andorra
16th Privacy Enhancing Technologies Symposium (PETs 2016)
within the First Security & Privacy Week SPW2016
July 19 - July 22, 2016
Darmstadt, Germany
2016 Winter Tor dev meeting
and the Internet Freedom Festival in Las Naves, Valencia.
26th February - 2nd March, 2016
Valencia, Spain
9th International Conference on Computers, Privacy and Data Protection (CPDP2016)
[in]visibilities and infrastructures
27th - 29th January, 2016
in Les Halles, Brussels, Belgium
Post-Snowden Cryptography Workshop (PSC)
9th and 10th December, 2015
Brussels, Belgium
[videos]
2015 Summer Tor dev meeting
27th September - 2nd October, 2015
betahaus, Berlin, Germany
15th Privacy Enhancing Technologies Symposium (PETs 2015)
June 30 - July 2, 2015
Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA, USA
Security in Times of Surveillance
7th May, 2015
in the Institute for the Protection of Systems and Information, Eindhoven, The Netherlands
2015 Winter Tor dev meeting
within the OpenITP Circumvention Tech Festival
1st - 6th March, 2015
in Las naves, Valencia, Spain
8th International Conference on Computers, Privacy and Data Protection (CPDP2015)
Data Protection on the Move
21st - 23rd January, 2015
in Les Halles, Brussels, Belgium
Final SPION Workshop
You are not alone. How to Tackle Security and Privacy in Online Social Networks.
16th December, 2014
in the Faculty Club, Groot Begijnhof, Leuven, Belgium
21st ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS2014)
3rd - 7th November, 2014
in The Scottsdale Plaza Resort, Scottsdale, Arizona, USA
Workshop on Ethics & Privacy Issues in the Application of Learning Analytics
28th October, 2014
in Swingo event Labs, Utrecht
14th Privacy Enhancing Technologies Symposium (PETs 2014)
16th - 18th July, 2014
in the Royal Tropical Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
2014 Summer Tor dev meeting
1st - 4th July, 2014
in Paris, France
2014 Crypto Summer School
Design and security of cryptographic algorithms and devices for real-world applications
1st - 6th June, 2014
in Sibenik, Croatia
2014 Secure Application Development (SecAppDev)
10th - 14th February, 2014
in the Faculty Club, KU Leuven, Belgium
7th International Conference on Computers, Privacy and Data Protection (CPDP2014)
Reforming data protection: The global perspective
22nd - 24th January, 2014
in Les Halles, Brussels, Belgium
SPION Workshop on Privacy and Responsibilisation (SPION Workshop)
When mitigating privacy risks is seen primarily as the users' responsibility.
21st January, 2014
in ESAT, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
20th ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS2013)
4th - 8th November, 2013
in the Berlin Congress Center (BCC), Berlin, Germany
16th Intensive Programme on Information & Communication Security (IPICS2013)
14th - 27th July, 2013
in the University of the Aegean in Samos Island, Greece
11th International Conference on Privacy, Security and Trust (PST2013)
10th - 12th July, 2013
in the University of Rovira i Virgili (URV), Tarragona, Spain
9th International Conference on Modeling Decisions for Artificial Intelligence (MDAI2012)
21st - 23rd November, 2012
in the University of Girona (UdG), Girona, Spain

Presentations and talks

Lecture in the Brussels School of Competition's course on AI and Cybersecurity
10th May 2019
VBO-FEB, Brussels, Belgium
[slides]
Talk in the ICRC workshop
2nd April 2019
VUB, Brussels, Belgium
[slides]
Talk in Deep Learning and Security Workshop
14th December 2017
NUS, Singapore
[slides]
Guest Lecture in the TU Wien's Privacy Enhacing Technologies' course
organized by SBA Research
1st December 2017
TU Wien, Vienna, Austria
[slides]
COSIC Seminar: Website Fingerprinting Attacks and Defenses in the Tor Onion Space
23rd October 2017
in ESAT, KU Leuven, Leuven
[slides]
Seminar at Computer Communications and Applications Lab
9th October 2017
in EPFL, Lausanne, Switzerland
[slides]
PETS'17 paper presentation: Website Fingerprinting Defenses at the Application Layer
19th July 2017
in University of Minesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA
[slides] [video]
Seminar at RIT CyberSecurity lab
10th July 2017
in Rochester, NY, USA
[slides]
Seminar at CrySyS lab
27th February, 2017
in Budapest, Hungary
[slides]
PETs'16 rump session about website fingerprinting crawlers
20th July 2016
Darmstadt, Germany
[slides]
ESORICS 2016
26th September, 2016
in Heraklion, Crete, Greece
[slides]
Modeling Decisions for Artificial Intelligence 2016 (MDAI)
19th September, 2016
in the Universitat d'Andorra, Sant Julià de Lòria, Andorra
[slides]
2016 Secure Application Development (SecAppDev)
9th March, 2016
in the Faculty Club, KU Leuven, Belgium
[slides]
PETs'15 rump session about ongoing work on Website Fingerprinting
1st July 2015
Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA, USA
[without slides]
CCS'14 presentation: A Critical Evaluation of Website Fingerprinting Attacks
4th November 2014
in the Scottsdale Plaza Resort, Scottsdale, AZ, USA
[slides]
COSIC Seminar: A Critical Evaluation of Website Fingerprinting Attacks
30th October 2014
in ESAT, KU Leuven, Leuven
[slides]
PETs'14 rump session on the critical evaluation of Website Fingerprinting attacks
17th July 2014
in the Royal Tropical Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
[slides]
Reading sessions and work in progress
several presentations in the COSIC Privacy Group meetings

Service

Teaching Assistant
Academic year 2016/17
Privacy Enhanching Technologies (B-KUL-H09L2A): This is a course of the Master in Electrical Engineering. I gave two theory lectures on traffic analysis and anonymous communications.
Teaching Assistant
Academic years 2014/15 and 2015/16
Privacy and Big Data (B-KUL-H00Y2A): This is a course of the Master in Artificial Intelligence, option Big Data. I helped preparing and orgainizing the exercise sessions.
Member of the following Program Committees
PETs 2019.2, WPES 2018, DPM 2016/17/18, ATC 2016/17/18.
External reviewer
Conferences: Financial Cryptography 2015, ACM CCS 2014 and 2017, USENIX Security Symposium 2014, SPACE 2015, PETs 2016, 2017 and 2018, S&P 2016; journals: Transactions on Data Privacy, Elsevier Computers & Security; and books: Advanced Research in Data Privacy
Session Chair of: 'Privacy' in MDAI2016, 'Privacy Protection' in DPM2016, 'Anonymous communications' in HotPETS'17, 'Deus Ex Machine Learning' in HotPETS'18
Publication Chair
of PETS 2017 and 2018
Daily supervisor of MSc theses: Vera Rimmer (2015/16), Samantha Wojtowicz (2015/16) and Ximena Robles (2014/15).

Research visits / stays

International Computer Science Institute (ICSI), Berkeley, CA, USA
Supervisor: Sadia Afroz and Michael C. Tschantz
May - July, 2018
Center for Cybersecurity, Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, NY, USA
Supervisor: Prof. Matthew Wright
May - August, 2017
Privacy, Security, and Automation Laboratory (PSAL), Drexel University, Philadelphia, USA
Supervisor: Prof. Rachel Greenstadt
November, 2013
Computer Security and Industrial Cryptography (COSIC), ESAT, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
Supervisor: Prof. Claudia Diaz
February - July, 2013

Contributions and other projects

Google Summer of Code 2014 (GSoC2014)
in the Tor Project
Title: A Framework for Website Fingerprinting Countermeasures
Mentors: Mike Perry and Yawning Angel
May - July, 2014
[pdf] [src]
Master thesis
in the IIIA-CSIC
Title: DisPA, un Agent per a la Cerca Privada a la Web
Supervisors: Vicenç Torra and Guillermo Navarro
Feb, 2012 - Jan, 2013
[pdf] [src]