Brief bio

I am an associate professor in the Khoury College of Computer Sciences at Northeastern University (2013--present), and Executive Director of Northeastern's Cybersecurity and Privacy Institute (2021-2023). My research is primarily in the areas of distributed systems and networking, with a recent focus on privacy, security, transparency, and mobile systems. I am a recipient of the NSF CAREER award, the ACM/CRA Computing Innovation Fellowship, and the Outstanding Dissertation Award in EECS at Northwestern University. Outcomes of my research have been covered by the popular press including the New York Times, CBS News, PBS, NPR, the Boston Globe, NBC News, WIRED, Vice News, and Science Magazine, and my research has been supported by the National Science Foundation, Department of Homeland Security, Measurement Lab, Google Research, Comcast, Verizon, ARCEP, and the Data Transparency Lab.

Before joining Northeastern, I was a postdoctoral research associate in Tom Anderson's group at the University of Washington. This work has been generously funded by the CI Fellows program. I earned my PhD in Computer Science from Northwestern University in June, 2010, where I was awarded two Cabell Fellowships and 2009/2010 Outstanding Dissertation in EECS. Prior to that, I graduated from Amherst College, magna cum laude, in 2002 with a double-major in Physics and French. Since the job market for francophone physicists dried up, I was left with no choice but to pursue a career in the textbook-authorship business with Deitel & Associates. In two years, I worked on three books, two of which I coauthored. After that, I decided it was time for me to stop writing about others' work and start making my own to write about. Fortunately, Fabián saw fit to entertain this notion.

CV

Also available as a PDF.

College of Computer and Information Science
Northeastern University
360 Huntington Avenue
613 ISEC
Boston, Massachusetts 02115

Tel. [on request only]
E-mail:
E-mail: choffnes *at* ccs <dot> neu <dot> edu
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Research Interests

My research interests are broadly in the areas of networking, distributed systems, and mobile computing. My recent focus is improving the performance and reliability of Internet and mobile systems. Please see my research statement and publications list for details.

Academic Appointments

Honors

Selected Publications (full list)

Selected Projects and Software Releases (full list)

Professional Service

Invited Talks

Selected Popular Press