Academic Staff

Director of the ISG Smart Card Centre

Professor Keith Mayes (B.Sc. (Bath) Ph.D. (Bath) CEng FIET) received his BSc (Hons) in Electronic Engineering in 1983 from the University of Bath (www.bath.ac.uk), and his PhD degree in Digital Image Processing in 1987. During his first degree he was employed by Pye TVT (Philips) which designed and produced TV broadcast and studio equipment. His PhD was sponsored by Honeywell Aerospace and Defence and on completion he accepted their offer of a job. In 1988 he started work for Racal Research where he worked on a wide range of research and advanced development products and was accepted as a Chartered Engineer. In 1995 he joined Racal Messenger to continue work on a Vehicle Licence plate recognition system (Talon) and an early packet radio system (Widanet/Paknet). In 1996 Keith joined Vodafone as a Senior Manager working within the Communication Security and Advanced Development group, under Professor Michael Walker. Early work concerned advanced radio relaying systems and involved participation in international standardisation (ETSI SMG2). Later he led the Maths & Modelling team and eventually took charge of the Fraud & Security group. During this time he was training in intellectual property and licensing, culminating in membership of the Licensing Executives Society and the added responsibility for patent issues in Vodafone UK. In 2000, following some work on m-commerce and an increasing interest in Smart Cards he joined the Vodafone International organisation as the Vodafone Global SIM Card Manager, responsible for SIM card harmonisation and strategy for the Vodafone Group (www.vodafone.com). In 2002, Keith left Vodafone to set up Crisp Telecom (www.crisptele.com) and in November 2002 he was also appointed as the Director of the Smart Card Centre (www.scc.rhul.ac.uk) at Royal Holloway University of London (www.rhul.ac.uk), reporting to Professor Fred Piper in the world renowned Information Security Group (www.isg.rhul.ac.uk).  Keith is a Founder Associate Member of the Institute of Information Security Professionals and a member of the Advisory Board for the Sensing and Security Group SIG within the London Technology Network (LTN). He has also had director experience within a London stock market listed company and a subsidiary of an American communications company. Recent high profile activity included leading the expert team that carried out counter-expertise work on the Ov-Chipkaart for the Dutch transport ministry, following published attacks on the Mifare Classic chip card.

Room: 156 Founders West - Tel: 01784 414408
E-mail: keith.mayes@rhul.ac.uk

Dr Kostas Markantonakis M.Sc., Ph.D., MBA (London) received his BSc (Hons) in Computer Science from Lancaster University in 1995, his MSc in Information Security in 1996, his PhD in Smart card Security in 2000 and his MBA in International Management in 2005 from Royal Holloway, University of London. He is currently a Reader in the Information Security Group. His main research interests include smart card security and applications; secure cryptographic protocol design and analysis, Public Key Infrastructures (PKI), key management, mobile phone security, embedded system security. Since completing his PhD, he has worked as an independent consultant in a number of information security and smart card related projects. He has worked as a Multi-application smart card Manager for VISA EU, responsible for multi-application smart card technology for southern Europe. More recently, he was working as a Senior Information Security Consultant for Steer Davies Gleave, responsible for advising transport operators and financial institutions on the use of smart card technology. He is also a member of the IFIP Working Group 8.8 on Smart Cards. He continues to act as a consultant on a variety of topics including smart card security, key management, information security protocols, mobile devices, smart card migration program planning/project management for financial institutions, transport operators, technology integrators.

Room: 158 Founders West - Tel: 01784 414409
E-mail: K.Markantonakis@rhul.ac.uk

Gerhard Hancke (B.Eng , M.Eng , PhD, CSCIP) joined the ISG Smart Card Centre in August 2007. Responsible for the ISG Smart Card Centre’s RFID/Contactless research track and RF/Hardware laboratory he has participated in consulting activities and successfully delivered industry research projects. In September 2011 he became a Fellow within the ISG, and maintains an interest in the work conducted at the SCC .His main interests are the security of pervasive computing, mobile technology and RFID tokens and the practical implementation of security exploits against secure hardware devices. Previously, he received a Bachelor of Engineering degree in Computer Engineering from the University of Pretoria (South Africa) in 2002 and a Masters of Engineering degree from the same institution in 2003, both with distinction. In 2003 he started reading for a PhD in Computer Science with the Security group at the University of Cambridge’s Computer Laboratory, which he completed in 2008.

Room: McCrea 223 - Tel: 01784 414922
E-mail: Gerhard.Hancke@rhul.ac.uk

Guest Lecturers

Oliver Richter VP Telecommunications Giesecke & Devrient GmbH	Wolfgang Rankl G&D www.wrankl.de
Simon Reed ORGA	Chris Shire Infineon
Tim Evans SIM Design Authority Vodafone UK	Rudolf Oswald Senior Engineer Swisscom www.swisscom-mobile.ch
Gary Waite mm02	John Tierney Project Manager MasterCard Chip Centre of Excellence www.mastercard.com
David Main Payment Technologies Visa Europe	Rob Davis Product Marketing Manager NDS VideoGuard www.nds.com

PhD Researchers

Lishoy Francis (B.E<India>,M.Sc<London>,CISSP<Associate>) received his Bachelor of Engineering degree in Computer Science & Engineering with a Distinction from Viveswaraiah Technological University, Belgaum, India, in 2002. After graduating, he worked as a Software Engineer developing intranet and quality systems for Wipro Fluid Power Ltd., Bangalore, India, until early 2003. In 2004, he completed his Masters in Information Security at Royal Holloway, University of London. He is currently studying for a PhD degree supervised by Dr. Keith Mayes, and guided by Dr. Konstantinos Markantonakis. His research interests include: Smart Card/Tokens Security, Extensibility, Attacks & Countermeasures, Interoperability in Open Devices; and Content Protection and Management in Mobile & Pay TV systems. He is passionately enthusiastic about Information Security.

Room: 152 Founders West - Tel: 01784 414939
E-mail: l.francis@rhul.ac.uk
Homepage: www.isg.rhul.ac.uk/~lishoy/

Wei Dar Chen (Meng Computer system & Electronic Engineering) Wei Dar Chen (Meng Computer system & Electronic Engineering) received in King's College London in 2005. He is currently as a PhD student in the Smart Card Centre in Royal Holloway, University of London. His current research area includes the interaction of mobile/SIM/USIM as Universal Secure Portal with token devices; and research on the mobile hardware interface with the wireless/contactless of interaction.

Room: 152 Founders West - Tel: 01784 414939
E-mail: w.d.chen@rhul.ac.uk

Graham Hili Mr Graham Hili BSc Hons (Malta), MSc (Royal Holloway) began his career with the Vodafone Group (Malta) where he was in charge of the security and the availability of the mobile value added systems (SMS, MMS, WAP). After this he moved to a consultancy position with LogicaCMG and Orange Group in the Netherlands. His main field of specialisation is security and digital identity in virtual worlds. Graham is working under the supervision of Dr. Keith Mayes.

Room: Queens Annexe 104 - Tel: 01784 414939
E-mail: Graham.Hili.2009@rhul.ac.uk

Lazaros Kyrillidis Mr Lazaros Kyrillidis received his BSc in Computer Science from the Technological Educational Institute (T.E.I.) of Thessaloniki, Greece in 2005 and his MSc in Information Security from Royal Holloway in 2008. Before joining the ISG as an MSc student, he was a PHP developer and database administrator, while after graduating he has worked as an IT auditor and more recently as an Information Security consultant. His research interests include smart cards, mobile phones / smartphones security and network security & security architectures. He is conducting PhD research in smartphones security under the supervision of Dr. Keith Mayes. He is partly funded by Orange Labs UK. When not studying, he is a football, motorbikes and music addict.

Room: 154 Founders West - Tel: 01784 414423
E-mail: Lazaros.Kyrillidis.2011@live.rhul.ac.uk

Mehari Msgna Mr. Mehari G. Msgna received his BSc in Electronics and Communication Engineering (with distinction) from Mekelle Institute of Technology (MIT) in July 2007, MSc in Information Security (with distinction) at the ISG, Royal Holloway University of London in 2009. Currently he is studying for a PhD under the supervision of Dr. Konstantinos Markantonakis. His areas of interest, in general, are cryptography, smart cards/tokens security, side-channel attacks, virtual machine for embedded systems and biometrics.

Room: 154 Founders West - Tel: 01784 414423
E-mail: mehari.msgna.2011@live.rhul.ac.uk

Sheila Cobourne Sheila Cobourne (M.A.(Oxon), M.B.A., M.Sc.) read Physics at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, and went on to work as a systems analyst developing financial systems for various multi-national organisations. She studied the MSc in Information Security at RHUL and passed (with Distinction) in 2010. Her PhD research is concerned with the use of NFC phones and smart cards in challenging environments, with the aim of finding a practical security architecture which could be used in humanitarian operations. She is supervised by Dr Keith Mayes.

Room: 152 Founders West - Tel: 01784 414939
E-mail: sheila.cobourne.2008@live.rhul.ac.uk

Sarah Abu Ghazalah Sarah Abu Ghazalah received her BSc in Information System from King Khaled University, Saudi Arabia in 2008 and her MSc in Computing Science from University of Glasgow in 2011. After receiving her bachelor degree she worked as Teacher Assistance at King Khaled University. Currently, she is working on a PhD in the Smart Card Centre, under the supervision of Dr. Konstantinos Markantonakis.

Room: 154 Founders West - Tel: 01784 414423
E-mail: Sarah.AbuGhazalah.2012@live.rhul.ac.uk

Hafizah Mansor Hafizah Mansor received her Bachelor of Electrical and Electronics Engineering from Universiti Tenaga Nasional, Malaysia. She then worked at Malaysia Microelectronic Solutions, an IC design company that design smart card chips. Later she furthered he studies and received her MSc. Computer Science (Real Time Software Engineering) from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. She is now a PhD student in the Smart Card Centre under the supervision of Dr. Kostas Markantonakis. Her research interests include smart card security and cryptography.

Room: 154 Founders West - Tel: 01784 414423
E-mail: Hafizah.Mansor.2011@live.rhul.ac.uk

Visiting Researchers

Benoit Ducray Benoit Ducray is a visiting researcher from ESIEA (Ecole Superieure d'Informatique, Electronique, Automatique) in Paris. He is working on the recognition of movement and its potential application in secure identification. In 2010, Benoit spent three months working for Ricoh in Paris, and in 2011 he worked at Slidepath (Leica Microsystems) in Dublin.

Room: 152 Founders West - Tel: 01784 414939
E-mail: Benoit.Ducray@rhul.ac.uk

Past Members

Raja Naeem Akram (B.Sc Mathematics & Physics, M.Sc Computer Science, MSc Information Security, PhD Information Security) Received B.Sc from University of Punjab, Pakistan in 2002. After graduating, he studied for M.Sc Computer Science from University of Agriculture, Pakistan. In 2004, after completing the Master's course in Distinction he worked as IT/Computer Science teacher at Govt. M.C. High School, Samanabad. He completed his M.Sc Information Security from RHUL with Distinction in 2007. In 2012 he completed his PhD under the supervision of Dr. Konstantinos Markantonakis. His research interest areas include smart ownership models, user centric smart cards, smart card runtime environment, security evaluation methodology, artificial intelligence, and smart card operating systems. He is currently working as senior research fellow on the project fraud prevention and detection techniques in online affiliate marketing at Edinburgh Napier University.
URL: www.rnakram.com
E-mail: rajanaeem.akram.2008@live.rhul.ac.uk

Xuefei Leng (BSc Mathematics & MSc Information Security) received his first degree on Mathematics in Peking University(China) in 2004, then he finished MSc Information Security in Royal Holloway, University of London in 2005. He graduated from the Smart Card Centre with a PhD in 2010. His research areas included RFID technology and lightweight protocols for low-end RFID systems. He is also a fan of .NET technology and Windows programming.

Brian Portsmore (BSc (hons) Reading, MSc Royal Holloway) received his BSc in Electronic Engineering from Reading University in 1988, and is currently awaiting the result of his 2003 MSc in Information Security from Royal Holloway. He has worked for many telecomms companies as a software and systems engineer, mainly in the development of GSM products and systems. In 1995 he co-founded a software house specialising in GSM development.

Will Sirett (BSc Computing Science (hons), PhD Information Security) received his degree from Staffordshire University in 2002. He joined the Smart Card Centre in 2003 and completed his PhD in 2007, titled "Design, Analysis and Implementation of Temporally Aware Behaviour-Based Security in Smart Cards". He has published papers on various topics including satellite-TV security, over coming SIM bandwidth constraints and JavaCard related academic research. His interests include DRM, JavaCard and secure content provision within a device independent architecture. He is currently to be found working as a Derivatives Trader in the Asian markets based out of Hong Kong.

Damien Sauveron Since 2004/09 Damien Sauveron is assistant Professor at the XLIM Laboratory (UMR CNRS 6172) of the University of Limoges (France) where he is member of the "Security of Information" team. He obtained his PhD in Computer Science at the University Bordeaux 1 (France) in December 2004. The subject of his thesis was on the Java Card security (development of an emulator to experiment attacks against Java Card platform and applets; modeling some security problems). From 2001/09 to 2004/09, he worked on the Java Card security in the ITSEF (Information Technology Security Evaluation Facilities) of SERMA Technologies. His research interests are:

• Security of Smart Card (at hardware and software level)
• Security of the Java Card technology and multiapplication smart cards
• Security of Mobile ad hoc networks
• Security of Distributed Objects and Systems
• Security evaluation/certification processes
• Smart Card applications

 

Mike Tunstall(B.Sc. (London) M.Sc. (London)) holds a B.Sc. in Statistics, Operational Research and Management Studies (University College London), and an M.Sc. in Secure Electronic Commerce (Royal Holloway, London). He works for Gemplus, the world's leading smartcard manufacturer, as a Security Expert. He is currently enrolled as a part-time PhD student. His current research interests include the feasibility of fault attacks and the development of appropriate countermeasures.