Security, Privacy, and Consumer Protection
This course will cover the principles and practice of security, privacy, and consumer protection. Topics include: basic cryptography; physical, network, endpoint, and data security; privacy (including user surveillance and tracking); attacks and defenses; and relevant concepts in usable security. The course will place fundamental security and privacy concepts in the context of past and ongoing legal, regulatory, and policy developments, including: consumer privacy, censorship, platform content moderation, data breaches, net neutrality, government surveillance, election security, vulnerability discovery and disclosure, and the fairness and accountability of automated decision making, including machine learning systems. Students will learn both technical fundamentals and how to apply these concepts to public policy outputs and recommendations.
More detailed information is available in the syllabus.
Information about the agenda for each class meeting is available in the agenda.
Readings: Please read the posted material and (if applicable) watch the corresponding videos for that day before coming to the class meeting.
| Lecture | Topic | In-Class Activity | Reading | Assignments |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Overview | — | Fail, Trust | |
| 2 | Ethics | IRB | Bit-by-Bit | |
| Systems Security | ||||
| 3 | Key Management | Data Breach | PKI | PKI |
| 4 | Modern Authentication | Certificate Chains, Key Signing, OAuth | Access | |
| Internet Security | ||||
| 5 | Denial of Service and Botnets | Backdoors | Cannon, Roundup | |
| 6 | Routing Security | BGP | BGPSEC | |
| 7 | Web Security | CFAA | Same Origin | |
| 8 | DNS Security | DNS | Kaminsky | Authentication |
| Internet Privacy | ||||
| 9 | Web Privacy | IoT | Tracking | |
| 10 | Device Privacy | Web Tracking | IoT | |
| 11 | Privacy Law and Regulations | Omnibus | Solove | Privacy |
| 12 | Automated Compliance Enforcement | Copyright | CPRA | |
| 13 | AI and Privacy | LLM | LLM Disclosure | |
| Intellectual Property | ||||
| 14 | Copyright and Intellectual Property | Copyright | Copyright | Copyright Detection |
| 15 | AI and Copyright | Moderation | Fairness | |
| Online Discourse | ||||
| 16 | Content Moderation | Moderation | Moderation | LLM Moderation |
| 17 | Internet Censorship | Censorship | Censored | |
| Connectivity | ||||
| 18 | Broadband Internet | Broadband | Access |
| Lecture | Topic | Reading | Assignments |
|---|---|---|---|
| X | Election Security | Voting | |
| X | Net Neutrality | Interconnection | |
| X | AI and Accountability | Debate: AI | |
| X | Vulnerability Disclosure | Disclosure |