Graduate Computer Security Fall 2025

This graduate course covers foundational research in computer and network security. The goal of this course is to provide students with a broad understanding of classical and modern security problems, the mental models and techniques commonly used in the field, and practical experience conducting security research. This class will consist of reading and discussing academic papers and conducting and presenting an original research project. See the schedule for details.

Note: For historical reasons, the official registrar course title is "Introduction to Computer Security"; however this will be a graduate research course that assumes students have already taken CMSC 23200 (Intro to Security), or have equivalent knowledge. CMSC 23200 will not be offered until Spring 2026. Much of the course's structure and reading list is adapted from similar classes at peer universities, including CS 261N at UC Berkeley, CS 356 at Stanford, CSE 227 at UCSD, and CS8803-EMS at Georgia Tech.

Teaching Team

Instructor
Grant Ho
grantho@uchicago.edu

TA
Aniket Anand
aanand300@uchicago.edu

Course Information

Prerequisites	CMSC 23200 or equivalent
Lectures	Classes will be held from 3:30p - 4:50p on Tuesdays and Thursdays in Ryerson 276.
Office Hours	Tuesdays from 2:30 - 3:30pm in JCL 255
Textbook	These is no textbook for the course. This class will be focused on research paper reading, all of which are freely accessible via campus's network or the UChicago library proxy. Please contact me if you have any issues accessing assigned readings.
Communication	All online discussion and communication will happen via the Ed Discussion platform (also accessible via the course Canvas). You can post here to find teammates for your projects, as well as post a private message to me with questions, issues, or concerns you have.
Submission of work	All assignments will be collected via Gradescope. Class homeworks (written responses for the required readings), are due by 12:00pm on the day of the associated class; i.e., homeworks for Tuesday's required readings are due by 12:00pm.

Grading

Your course grade is based on three components: (1) reading and discussion for the assigned course papers, (2) presenting and leading the discussion for one assigned paper, and (3) completing a group research project.

Readings Responses and Discussion (30%)
Each class will explore a sub-area of computer security through discussions of 1-2 research papers. Students are expected to thoroughly read each of the required papers beforehand. To faciliate this understanding, students will submit a written response for each paper prior to the start of class (12:00pm on Gradescope). For classes with multiple required papers, include both responses in a single PDF, but start the second paper's write-up on a new page and include the title of each paper at the top of their corresponding page(s).

Each paper's written response will consist of two parts: (1) A summary of the paper's contributions and answers to the other key questions below and (2) an LLM-based exercise and reflection. Start each part on a new page in your submission. Submit your write-up on Gradescope and mark the sections of your write-up accordingly.
Late Policy: No late written homeworks will be accepted, however, you may skip up to two homework submissions starting in Week 2. In-class attendance and participation will be excused for illness, academic/research travel, and case-by-case circumstances.

The first part of your response to each required paper should answer the following key questions:

What are the paper's main contributions? (3-5 sentences max)
What parts of the paper are questionable? (E.g., methodology, omissions, relevance, presentation, ethics.) (3-5 sentences max)
Propose at least one question that you would like to have the class discuss about the paper.
What parts of the paper do you find unclear? (Optional)
Additionally, some homeworks will include an additional specific question or sometimes two regarding the topic, such as challenging you to come up with and defend a proposed solution.

The second part of your response is an experimental LLM-integrated exercise we are trying this quarter:

For the second part of your written responses to each required reading, pick a recent LLM (e.g., NotebookLM, PhoenixAI, Gemini, ChatGPT, etc.) and write a prompt to generate a summary of the paper. Only complete this part after completing Part 1 (the summary and key questions) on your own.
Read through the LLM generated response, and write a one-paragraph reflection assessing the quality and utility of the LLM-generated summary. Your reflection should answer the following questions: (1) Did the LLM summary capture anything important you missed in your summary or reading? (2) Were there any important details about the paper that it missed? (3) Do you think there would be a way to use the LLM to improve
Your write-up of this second-part should contain the following three sections: (1) The prompt and what model/tool you used, (2) The LLM-generated summary of the paper, and (3) Your reflection response addressing the questions above
NOTE: You may only do this AFTER you have read the paper and written your own summary of the paper. This second part of your response is the only part that can involve the use of an LLM; all other portions of your submission must be fully produced by yourself, without the use of any AI or automated tools.

Your written write-ups will compromise 20% of your total grade, and an additional 10% will come from class participation (not only attendance, but actively answering questions, providing your thoughts, and/or asking questions of your own).

Presenting and Leading a Paper Discussion (10%)
Each student will present and lead the discussion for one listed papers during the quarter. The presentation should be between 20-25minutes long and take the form of a slideshow.

For your presentation, submit your slides no later than 9:00pm on the day prior to your presentation (i.e., Monday by 9:00pm if you present on Tuesday’s class, and Wednesday by 9:00pm if you present on Thursday).
You are not required to submit the written response for any of the papers that day; you can simply submit a document stating that you were a discussion lead for that day along with the paper title.
Paper presentations should be structured similar to the presentations I gave in class and should cover the following key aspects: (1) What is the problem (key research questions) of the paper? (2) What is the motivation for the paper? (3) Provide a brief overview of any important background or prior work (4) What are the methods and approach to solving the problem (for measurement papers, this will be an overview of the data collection and analysis methods; for papers that develop a system, method, or attack, this will be a discussion of the techniques) (5) What are the results and what was the evaluation or analysis? (6) What are the limitations of the work (evaluation pitfalls, future work, etc.)? Your presentation should include at least a few questions for discussion, either intermingled throughout the presentation or at the end.

Course Project (60%)
Students will complete an original research project in small groups (2-4 students) on a topic of their choice related to security and privacy research. Each group will submit a 6-10 page written report at the end of the quarter, as well as present their work during the final weeks of class. The grade for your project will consist of the following components:

Project Proposal (5%): Due Oct 17
Submit one proposal per group and list all of the members of your group in the proposal.
Write a concise (approximately 1 page) project proposal that clearly states: (1) the problem you will be tackling and the motivation for your problem (i.e., why it matters and who will it will impact); (2) the key challenges the research will need to solve or study; (3) a high-level sketch of your approach and plan for the project, including milestones and a sketch for how you will evaluate / demonstrate the success of your approach. If there are any special resources you might need, mention these.
Preliminary Report (5%): Due Oct 31
Submit a short (1-2 page) progress report that describes what your group has accomplished, what work still remains, any obstacles your have encountered, and any preliminary insights or results.
Additionally, submit a preliminary related work write-up (1-3 pages) that contains an outline of the different sub-areas (paper subsections) of related work. In each of the outline's subsections, include a short paragraph that (1) summarizes what the subsection of work is about, (2) how it relates to your project, and (3) a list of relevant papers that your final paper will cover in each subsection.
For at least one of these subsections, fully write-up the section as if it were the final paper; the subsection your team writes should cover at least 5 papers.
Project Presentation (10%)
Each group will give a 15 minute presentation during the final two class days about their research project.
Final Report (40%): Due Dec 9
Submit a technical paper on the research you have done, in the style of conference papers we have read in class, that includes an abstract, introduction, related work, methodology, results, discussion, references, etc. The paper should be 6-10 pages long and use the Usenix Latex template.
State the problem you're addressing, motivate why it is an important or interesting problem, present your research thoroughly and clearly, compare to any related work that may exist, summarize your research contributions, and draw whatever conclusions may be appropriate. Here are two pointers on writing a good technical paper: Vern's advice and Henning's advice.

P/F Grade Policies

As outlined in UChicago's policy, this course may be taken pass/fail (P/F). Students who wish to take the course pass/fail, instead of for a letter grade, must make a Campuswire post with that request by the end of Week 9. A grade of P will be given to students who would have earned a C- or better in the course if it were taken for a letter grade. Note that classes taken pass/fail are unlikely to count toward the computer science major or other graduate degrees, so please only make a P/F request if you understand (in consultation with your advisor) how doing so will impact your ability to count this course towards your degree.

Academic Integrity Policies

The University of Chicago has formal policies related to academic honesty and plagiarism, as described by the university broadly and the college specifically. We abide by these standards in this course. Depending on the severity of the offense, you risk being dismissed altogether from the course. All cases will be referred to the Dean of Students office, which may impose further penalties, including suspension and expulsion. If you have any question about whether some activity would constitute cheating, please ask. In addition, we expect all students to treat everyone else in the course with respect, following the norms of proper behavior by members of the University of Chicago community.

Policy on AI and Language Models Usage: Except for specific questions or components that explicitly ask for AI/LLM usage, you may not use any generative AI tools or service, to generate the contents of any work you submit, such as the summaries of the required paper readings, answers to the reading questions, or your project report materials. Unless explicitly asked in a question, you must generate the response text that you submit on your own and without the use of any AI or LLM related technology.
You may use AI tools to improve the quality of your own original writing; however, for this use case, you may only provide the model text that you wrote yourself -- you may not provide any of the paper content to the model when using it to improve your writing quality. Any use of such tools must be clearly disclosed in your assignment submission, and must include all input prompts given to the tools. You are responsible for all content generated by any such tools as if you had written it yourself.

Wellness

If a personal emergency comes up that might impact your work in the class, please let the instructor know in a Ed Discussion (Canvas) post visible only to the instructors so that the course staff can make appropriate arrangements. University environments can sometimes be very overwhelming, and all of us benefit from support during times of struggle. You are not alone. There are many helpful resources available on campus and an important part of the college experience is learning how to ask for help. Asking for support sooner rather than later is often helpful. If you or anyone you know experiences any academic stress, difficult life events, or feelings like anxiety or depression, we strongly encourage you to seek support. The University of Chicago's counseling services are here to support you. Consider also reaching out to a friend, faculty or family member you trust for help getting connected to the support that can help.

If you or someone you know is feeling suicidal or in danger of self-harm, call someone immediately, day or night:
• Student Counseling Urgent Care: (773)702-9800 or in person.
• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255.