I am a tenure-track Assistant Professor of Computer Science at the School of Computing at Southern Illinois University. I am the founding director of the Security and Privacy Enhanced Machine Learning Lab (SUPREME Lab), where my group develops privacy-enhanced secure systems with machine learning applications. I am also a member of the NSF IUCRC Center for Intelligent, Distributed, Embedded Applications and Systems (IDEAS) and Center for Research and Education in AI and Cybersecurity (CARE-AI-C). My current research interests include security and privacy with applications in online and geosocial networks, machine learning, wireless networks, distributed systems, and mobile applications. Widely cited in books and research papers, my research has been funded by leading federal agencies like National Science Foundation (NSF), Cyber Florida, Florida Center for Cybersecurity, etc. I am the recipient of the prestigious 2022 NSF CISE CRII award by the Directorate for Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE) under the Secure and Trustworthy Cyberspace (SaTC) program. I am also the recipient of the 2022 Illinois Manufacturing Excellence Center (IMEC) award. I am the nominee of the PennWest's Scholar of the Year in 2020 and SIU's University-Level Early Career Faculty Excellence Award in 2022.

My research has been published in reputed journals and top CS conferences including ACM TSC, Nature Scientific Reports, ANS Transactions, ASONAM, ACM SAC, ICWSM, ACM CHI, ACM WebSci, and has received media attention from many news outlets including prominent national and international outlets. NBC 6 has featured my research as a sweeps prime-time story and Sage Research Methods based on UK has made my research methods available to academic libraries for subscription or purchase aimed at helping students and early career researchers. I am the recipient of several research travel grants and have been invited by Facebook Research to their HQ. My paper has won best paper award on multiple occasions. I am the author of multiple Book Chapters including the book “Artificial Intelligence Applications for Health Care" by Taylor & Francis (CRC Press), USA and “Principles and Practice of Blockchains" by Springer Nature Switzerland AG. I am a member of IEEE and ACM, and serving on the editorial boards and program committees in numerous prestigious conferences and journals including ACM Asian Conference on Computer and Communications Security (ASIACCS), IEEE International Conference on Networking Systems and Security, IEEE Computer Software and Applications Conference (COMPSAC), EAI International Conference on Security and Privacy in Communication Systems (SecureComm), ACM CCSC, Big Data and Cognitive Computing (BDCC), Applied Sciences Journal and ACL Workshop on Abusive Language Online. I have mentored over thirty students, including K-12 high school teachers, undergraduate students, and graduate students in several programs, such as Science without Borders’s Summer Research Program, NSF’s Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU), and NSF’s Research Experience for Teachers (RET). Before joining SIU, I was a tenure-track Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Pennsylvania Western University (PennWest), where I was the founder and director of the Privacy-Enhanced Security Lab (PENSLab) and was leading their Cybersecurity program.