Postdoctoral Fellow in Cybersecurity of AI for Autonomous Ships

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At NTNU, 9,000 employees and 43,000 students work to create knowledge for a better world.

You can find more information about working at NTNU and the application process here.

About the job

The postdoctoral fellowship position is a temporary position where the main goal is to qualify for work in senior academic positions.

The position is related to the Cloud-based Platform-agnostic Adversarial AI Defence framework– CPAID project. The cPAID project aims to create a cloud-based, platform-agnostic framework for protecting AI applications from malicious actions and adversarial attacks. It focuses on combating poisoning and evasion attacks using AI defence methods like AI-assisted anomaly detection, ML-based IDS, and adversarial training, combined with security- and privacy-by-design, explainable AI, and threat intelligence. cPAID will also develop a methodology to ensure AI system security, privacy, robustness against attacks, and adherence to EU AI ethics, with real-life scenario validations including an autonomous and remotely monitored autonomous ship. Additionally, it seeks to advance research on certification schemes for AI application robustness, security, privacy, and ethical standards.

Duties of the position

• Contribute to the drafting of technical specifications and requirements for the application of the cPAID framework against the autonomous ship use case.
• Conducting threat modelling and identification of adversarial threats against AI tools for object recognition in maritime navigation applications.
• Collaborate with relevant partners in the development of an autonomous navigation dataset for AI developers with embedded resiliency to adversarial threats.
• Contribute the capacity building for AI defence activities through the development of game scenarios and capture-the-flag competitions.
• Refining the framework modules to ensure seamless and secure collaboration, while also creating a functionally integrated platform that can operate across various environments.
• Verifying that these refinements do not negatively impact the performance of both the individual framework modules and the framework platform as a whole.
• Presentation and publication of results.
• Develop national and international collaborations with relevant academic and industrial partners.

Required selection criteria

• You must have completed a Norwegian doctoral degree or a corresponding foreign doctoral degree recognized as equivalent to a Norwegian PhD in Cybersecurity. If you can document that the PhD thesis has been submitted, your application can be assessed even if you have not yet defended your dissertation. Documentation of the obtained doctoral degree must be presented before you can take up the position.
• Good written and oral English skills.
• Documented experience with relevant laboratory work and research activity listed under tasks.

The appointment is to be made in accordance with Regulations on terms of employment for positions such as postdoctoral fellow, Ph.D Candidate, research assistant and specialist candidate.

Preferred selection criteria

• Doctoral degree in cybersecurity or other relevant field mentioned in this call.
• Experience with research in maritime cybersecurity.
• Experience with research in the intersections between cybersecurity and artificial intelligence.
• Experience with the development of distributed technical capabilities for cybersecurity research and testing.
• Experience with planning and conducting research projects.

Personal characteristics

• Being able to travel.
• Flexibility and willingness to work on a broad range of topics covered by the activities of the CISaR group.
• Initiative-taking and self-starter who works well with minimal supervision and shows excellent judgement about when to look to managers and teammates for guidance, and when and how to communicate with diverse stakeholders.
• Team player with a proven track record of building cross-functional relationships and ability to work in an international research team.
• Effective communication and negotiation skills, both written and verbal persuasiveness and strong influential skills.
• Eager to learn with a high desire to perform and disseminate high-quality research.

Emphasis will be placed on personal and interpersonal qualities.

We offer

• exciting and stimulating tasks in a strong international academic environment
• an open and inclusive work environment with dedicated colleagues
• favourable terms in the Norwegian Public Service Pension Fund
• employee benefits

Salary and conditions

As a Postdoctoral Fellow (code 1352) you are normally paid from gross NOK 594 500 per annum before tax, depending on qualifications and seniority. From the salary, 2% is deducted as a contribution to the Norwegian Public Service Pension Fund.

The period of employment is 3 years.

The engagement is to be made in accordance with the regulations in force concerning State Employees and Civil Servants, and the acts relating to Control of the Export of Strategic Goods, Services and Technology. Candidates who by assessment of the application and attachment are seen to conflict with the criteria in the latter law will be prohibited from recruitment to NTNU.

After the appointment you must assume that there may be changes in the area of work.

The position is subject to external funding.

It is a prerequisite you can be present at and accessible to the institution on a daily basis.

About the application

The application and supporting documentation to be used as the basis for the assessment must be in English.

Publications and other scientific work must follow the application. Please note that your application will be considered based solely on information submitted by the application deadline. You must therefore ensure that your application clearly demonstrates how your skills and experience fulfil the criteria specified above.

If, for any reason, you have taken a career break or have had an atypical career and wish to disclose this in your application, the selection committee will take this into account, recognizing that the quantity of your research may be reduced as a result.

The application must include:

• CV and certificates.
• Transcripts and diplomas for bachelor's-, master's- and PhD degrees. If you have not yet completed your Ph.D, you must provide confirmation on your estimated date for the doctoral dissertation, or that your PhD thesis has been submitted.
• A copy of the doctoral thesis. If you are close to submitting, or have recently submitted your thesis, you can attach a draft of the thesis. Documentation of a completed doctoral degree must be presented before taking up the position.
• Academic works - published or unpublished - that you would like to be considered in the assessment (up to 5 items).
• Research plan.
• Name and contact information of three referees.

If all, or parts, of your education has been taken abroad, we also ask you to attach documentation of the scope and quality of your entire education. Description of the documentation required can be found here. If you already have a statement from NOKUT, please attach this as well.

Joint works will be considered. If it is difficult to identify your contribution to joint works, you must attach a brief description of your participation.

In the evaluation of which candidate is best qualified, emphasis will be placed on education, experience and personal and interpersonal qualities. Motivation, ambitions, and potential will also count in the assessment of the candidates.

NTNU is committed to following evaluation criteria for research quality according to The San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment - DORA.

General information

Working at NTNU

NTNU believes that inclusion and diversity is a strength. We want our faculty and staff to reflect Norway’s culturally diverse population and we continuously seek to hire the best minds. This enables NTNU to increase productivity and innovation, improve decision making processes, raise employee satisfaction, compete academically with global top-ranking institutions and carry out our social responsibilities within education and research. NTNU emphasizes accessibility and encourages qualified candidates to apply regardless of gender identity, ability status, periods of unemployment or ethnic and cultural background.

NTNU is working actively to increase the number of women employed in scientific positions and has a number of resources to promote equality.

The city of Gjøvik has a population of 30 000 and is a town known for its rich music and cultural life. The beautiful nature surrounding the city is ideal for an active outdoor life! The Norwegian welfare state, including healthcare, schools, kindergartens and overall equality, is probably the best of its kind in the world.

As an employee at NTNU, you must at all times adhere to the changes that the development in the subject entails and the organizational changes that are adopted.

A public list of applicants with name, age, job title and municipality of residence is prepared after the application deadline. If you want to reserve yourself from entry on the public applicant list, this must be justified. Assessment will be made in accordance with current legislation. You will be notified if the reservation is not accepted.

If you have any questions about the position, please contact Associate Professor Vasileios Gkioulos, email vasileios.gkioulos@ntnu.no or Researcher Ahmed Amro, email ahmed.amro@ntnu.no. If you have any questions about the recruitment process, please contact Julie Lindland, e-mail: julie.lindland@ntnu.no.

If you think this looks interesting and in line with your qualifications, please submit your application electronically via jobbnorge.no with your CV, diplomas and certificates attached. Applications submitted elsewhere will not be considered. Upon request, you must be able to obtain certified copies of your documentation.

Application deadline: 15.06.24