About

Senior Research Scientist at RISE (Stockholm). Ph.D., KU Leuven/COSIC. WG lead and contributor in next-generation wireless networks (NGWN) and edge–cloud security. Horizon Europe contributor; active in EU and Swedish funding proposals. Security- and privacy-by-design for EVs, supply chains, manufacturing, data spaces, identity/PKI, and end-to-end messaging; contributed to ~SEK 10M in funded projects. Previously at KTH, SnT (Luxembourg), and KU Leuven. Team-first; strong cross-domain stakeholder engagement. International media coverage for “Collateral Damage of Facebook Apps.” Teaching and supervision in networked systems security. ISO/IEC 27001 Lead Auditor.

  • WG leader/co-lead in security-by-design of systems (BEiNG-WISE for NGWN/6G; NexusForum for the Edge-to-Cloud Computing Continuum)
  • ~SEK 10M funded; cross-domain EU collaborations
  • Media: Wired, NBC, The Atlantic
  • ISO/IEC 27001 Lead Auditor; teaching & supervision at KTH/RISE

Current Skills & Interests

Current Projects (Selection)

  1. – Current

    TWINLOOP [Horizon Europe 🇪🇺]

    Role Description: Project Contributor

    Description: Contributing to research on secure and trustworthy AI-driven digital twins for critical infrastructures under the Horizon Europe programme.

    Programme: Horizon Europe (HORIZON)

    Call: Advanced digital development tools to accelerate the development of software-defined vehicles that enable zero-emission mobility (2ZERO Partnership) — HORIZON-CL5-2024-D5-01-05

    Learn more: twin-loop.eu

  2. – Current

    NexusForum Research & Innovation Roadmap, Cognitive Computing Continuum [Horizon Europe 🇪🇺]

    Role Description: Working Group Co-Leader – Cybersecurity for the Cognitive Computing Continuum Roadmap

    Description: Cross-sector collaboration on secure digital ecosystems and next-generation network resilience.

    Programme: Horizon Europe (HORIZON)

    Call: Coordination and Support of Cognitive Computing Continuum research and policy (CSA) — HORIZON-CL4-2023-DATA-01

    Learn more: NexusForum.eu

  3. – Current

    CitCom.ai (AI TEF SCC) [Digital Europe 🇪🇺 & Vinnova 🇸🇪]

    Role: Project Contributor — Task 3.3: Cybersecurity, Resilience & Connectivity (Edge/IoT)

    What I do in T3.3: Help design and validate a cybersecurity stack for TEF services, including data & user activity monitoring, intrusion detection, role/attribute-based access control with identity integration (e.g., Keycloak), and ML-based anomaly detection for early APT/fault discovery.

    Consortium: 32 partners across 11 EU member states

    Budget (Sweden): 18 M SEK

    Learn more: CitComTEF · RISE project page · Vinnova

  4. – Current

    Behavioral Next Generation in Wireless Networks for Cyber Security (BEiNG-WISE) [COST Action 🇪🇺]

    Role Description: Working Group Leader — Cybersecurity in Emerging Wireless Communications

    Description: Coordinating research in next-generation wireless cybersecurity (5G/6G), including workshops, training, dissemination, and cross-disciplinary collaboration.

    Funding Agency: COST Action

    COST Action webpage: BEiNG-WISE

    Learn more: beingwise.eu

  5. –

    Datadelning i en digitaliserad köttkedja [FORMAS 🇸🇪]

    Role: Project Contributor — Researcher

    Role Description: Research on sustainable data sharing and digital transformation in industrial systems, with focus on cybersecurity, privacy, and data analytics to support data-driven decision-making in the digitalized meat supply chain.

    Funding Agency: Formas — Swedish Research Council for Sustainable Development

    Budget: 11.8 M SEK

    Learn more: Mot datadelning och datadrivna beslut i en digitaliserad köttkedja

Education

Certifications & Training (selection)

Invited Talks (selection)

Media Attention

Research featured in major international outlets related to privacy, security, and the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

Selected Publications

See also: Google Scholar

Towards Empowering Stakeholders Through Decentralized Trust and Secure Livestock Data Sharing (2025)

Authors: Abdul Ghafoor, Iraklis Symeonidis, Anna Rydberg, Cecilia Lindahl, Abdul Qadus Abbasi

Venue: Cryptography 9(3):52

Publisher · DOI:10.3390/cryptography9030052

Emerging Cybersecurity Paradigms in Wireless Networks: Physical Layer Innovation, Trust, and AI-Enhanced Defenses (2025)

Editors: Iraklis Symeonidis, Valeria Loscri (BEiNG-WISE WG1 White Paper)

Venue: BEiNG-WISE (COST Action CA22104) — White Paper

Project page

Drowsiness and Fatigue Recognition Systems for Connected Vehicles, 6G and the EU AI Act (2025)

Authors: Ana Ferreira, Başak Ozan Özparlak, Hartmut Aden, Iraklis Symeonidis, Mehmet Çetin, Eirini Kanaki, Periklis Chatzimisios

Venue: Proc. EuCNC/6G Summit 2025

DOI

HERMES: Scalable, Secure, and Privacy-Enhancing Vehicle Access System (2021)

Authors: Iraklis Symeonidis, Dragos Rotaru, Mustafa A. Mustafa, Bart Mennink, Bart Preneel, Panos Papadimitratos

Venue: arXiv

arXiv · DOI:10.48550/arXiv.2101.01950

Collateral damage of Facebook third-party applications: a comprehensive study (2018)

Authors: Iraklis Symeonidis, Gergely Biczók, Fatemeh Shirazi, Cristina Pérez-Solà, Jessica Schroers, Bart Preneel

Venue: Computers & Security 77:179–208

Publisher · DOI:10.1016/j.cose.2018.03.015

Academic and Other Services

Event organizer:

Program Committee Memberships:

External Reviews:

Teaching & Supervision

  1. – Current

    PhD Supervision

    • PhD Supervisor — S. Mohammadi, Industrial PhD Student at RISE

  2. External PhD Evaluation

    • External PhD Evaluator — Rauli Kaksonen, University of Oulu, Finland
  3. –

    NSS@KTH — Teaching Assistant & MSc Supervision

    • Teaching Assistant at NSS@KTH
      • Networked Systems Security (NSS): Fundamentals of secure modern networked systems
      • Building NSS (BNSS): Implementation of secure networked systems
      • Advanced NSS (ANSS): Engineering of emerging secure networked infrastructures
    • MSc Thesis Supervision:
      • 2021–2022: A. Kotsias — “Layer 2 Smart Contracts for Secure Vehicular-Sharing Systems”
      • 2020–2021: S. Rabat — “Encrypted Documents Retrieval from the Cloud with Searchable Encryption”
      • 2021: J. Shan — “Secure Vehicular Sharing Systems Implementation”
  4. –

    COSIC @ KU Leuven — MSc Thesis Supervision

    • 2019–2020: D. De Troch — “dPACE: A Decentralized Privacy-Preserving, yet Accountable Car Sharing Environment”
    • 2017–2018: A. Madhusudan — “Applying Smart Contracts to Secure Car Sharing Systems”
    • 2017–2018: D. Reardon — “Prevalence of Device Fingerprinting in Browser Extensions”
    • 2016–2017: S. Dhooghe — “Applying Multiparty Computation to Car Access Provision”
    • 2015–2016: T. Bertels — “Design of a Pairing Protocol for the AR.Drone 2.0”
    • 2015–2016: K. Domin — “Security Analysis of the Drone Communication Protocol: Fuzzing the MAVLink Protocol”
  5. –

    Educator & Instructor — Ministry of Education, Police Academy, Lifelong Learning

    • Educator & Instructor — Ministry of Education, Police Academy, Lifelong Learning
      • Web Programming: PHP, SQL, and web technologies
      • Application Development: Algorithmic logic and programming, university entrance prep
      • ICT Technologies: CS principles, mathematics, ICT-enhanced learning
      • Microsoft Office Suite: Training & certification (Police Academy & private sector)

Personal Interests

Contact