PhD in Computer Science

At Mälardalen University people meet who want to develop themselves and the future. Our 16 000 students read courses and study programmes in Business, Health, Engineering and Education. We conduct research within all areas of education and have internationally outstanding research in future energy and embedded systems. Our close cooperation with the private and public sectors enables us at MDH to help people feel better and the earth to last longer. Mälardalen University is located on both sides of Lake Mälaren with campuses in Eskilstuna and Västerås.

At the School of Innovation, Design and Engineering our students are studying to be for example innovators, entrepreneurs, illustrators, communications officers, network technicians and engineers. Here we have the research specialisations of Embedded Systems, and Innovation and Product Realisation. Our work takes place in cooperation with and in strategic agreements with companies, organisations and public authorities in the region.

Employment information
Employment: Temporary employment
Scope: Full time
Closing date for application: August 15, 2020
Campus location: Västeras
School: School of Innovation, Design and Engineering, (IDT)

Position description
We are looking for one new PhD student specializing in cyber-security, software testing and DevOps practices. The student will be recruited under the VeriDevOps (Automated Protection and Prevention to Meet Security Requirements in DevOps Environments) project, a joint research project between several European partners.

In recent years, security vulnerabilities are omnipresent in many application domains and the number of security scenarios to be ensured explodes. For example, in the embedded software domain, the number of system interactions with the environment that are subject to security attacks is increasing and may result in security vulnerabilities that can cause losses for end-users including drastic increase in the production and maintenance costs, especially if iterations in development process are long and feedback comes late.

VeriDevOps aims at providing a faster feedback loop for verifying security requirements i.e. confidentiality, integrity, availability, authentication, authorization and other functional and extra-functional attributes of large scale industrial systems. VeriDevOps is focusing on optimizing the security verification activities, by automatically creating verifiable specifications directly from security requirements and vulnerabilities, and using these security specifications to check security properties against design specifications and generate artefacts such as tests or monitors that can be used later on in the DevOps process.

More concretely, in VeriDevops we will develop methods and tools for: 1) creating formal security specifications from textual sources using natural language processing, 2) automatic security test creation and selection from security specifications using model-based testing and 3) generating intelligent/adaptive, machine learning based security monitors for the operational phases. Automation of different security verification phases will play a key role in VeriDevOps.

At MDH, the PhD student will be part of the Software Testing Laboratory (STL) and the Formal Modelling and Analysis of Embedded Systems (FMAES) Research Groups, which are vibrant research groups, having several seniors and PhD students, working in close collaboration with industry. The candidate is expected to work closely with the MDH staff and other scientific partners, as well as the industrial partners.

We expect the suitable candidate to develop own ideas and work independently when needed, as well as take responsibility for the work. Since this position involves interaction with industrial professionals, effective collaborative skills are desired attributes. We require the suitable candidate to be proficient in writing, speaking and reading English, since disseminating and communicating scientific results is a must in this position.

Employment is limited and equivalent to full-time studies at the graduate level for 4 years, translating to 5 years in case of 20% departmental work and 80% research.

The PhD student will be employed by MDH and will receive a salary according to current salary agreements.

Qualifications
Only those who are or have been admitted to third-cycle courses and study programmes at a higher education may be appointed to doctoral studentships. For futher information see Chapter 5 of the Higher Education Ordinance (SFS 1993:100).

To qualify as a PhD student, you should have a master's level degree or equivalent with a solid documented background in computer science or computer/software engineering. The candidates should have knowledge and/or interest in security, software testing as well as programming. You may apply even if you have not completed your degree, but plan on doing so before the PhD student position starts. The position requires sound verbal and written communication skills in English.

Decisive importance is attached to personal suitability. We value the qualities that an even distribution of age and gender, as well as ethnic and cultural diversity, can contribute to the organization.

Application
Application is made online. Make your application by clicking the "Apply" button below.

The applicant is responsible for ensuring that the application is complete in accordance with the advertisement and will reach the University no later than closing date for application.

We look forward to receiving your application.


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