Tao Hou - Ph.D. Student at University of South Florida (USF)

Tao Hou

Ph.D. student,
Department of Computer Science and Engineering, University of South Florida
4202 E Fowler Ave, ENB 118, Tampa, FL 33620

Phone: 813.390.8851
Email: taohou@usf.edu

I am currently pursuing the Ph.D. degree in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at University of South Florida. My advisors are Dr. Zhuo Lu and Dr. Yao Liu. I received my B.E. degree and M.E. degree from Jilin University, China in 2013 and 2016, respectively. My research interests span quite a few areas, including network security, system security, machine learning for cybersecurity, high performance computing, and graph data analytics. I am especially interested in research problems that arise from practical domains, with a focus on both experimental/empirical study and sound theoretical footings. More recently, I am working mostly on web security, binary analysis, and adversarial machine learning.

One of my calligraphy works, the contents come from a poem by Tang poet Li Bai, entitled HARD TRAVELING.

"A time will come to ride the wind and cleave the waves, I’ll set my cloud-white sail and cross the sea which raves."

[Mar, 2022] "Dynamic and Lightweight Data-Channel Coupling towards Confidentiality in IoT Security" has been accepted to ACM WiSec 2022.

[Dec, 2021] Our paper entitled "MUSTER: Subverting User Selection in MU-MIMO Networks" has been accepted to IEEE INFOCOM 2022.

[Nov, 2021] The work on deceiving machine learning based IoT device identification by automated traffic camouflage has been accepted to IEEE DySPAN 2021.

[Oct, 2021] I will serve on the technical program committee of IEEE ICCCN 2022.

[Jul, 2021] Our paper on combating adversarial network inference has been accepted by IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking (ToN).

[Jan, 2021] I will serve on the artifact evaluation committee of EuroSys 2021.

[Jul, 2020] I will serve on the artifact evaluation committee of ACSAC 2020.

[Dec, 2019] The paper on proactive network topology obfuscation has been accepted by IEEE INFOCOM 2020.

[Nov, 2019] Our paper "Smart Spying via Deep Learning: Inferring Your Activities from Encrypted Wireless Traffic" won the Best Paper Award at IEEE GlobalSIP'19.

[Nov, 2019] I have been selected to receive a 2019 ACSAC Student Travel Grant.

[Oct, 2019] I received the International Travel Grant from USF OGS to attend the IEEE GlobalSIP'19 conference in Ottawa, Canada.

Ph.D. degree, University of South Florida, Tampa, Florida, 2022
RA in the Communications, Security, and Analytics (CSA) Lab.
GPA: 4.0 / 4.0 (All my courses got A or A+)

Master degree, Jilin University, China, 2016
RA in Key Laboratory of Symbolic Computation and Knowledge Engineering of Ministry of Education of China.

Bachelor degree, Jilin University, China, 2013
RA in Key Laboratory of Symbolic Computation and Knowledge Engineering of Ministry of Education of China.

MUSTER: Subverting User Selection in MU-MIMO Networks [ PDF ] Tao Hou, Shengping Bi, Tao Wang, Zhuo Lu, Yao Liu, Satyajayant Misra, and Yalin Sagduyu IEEE Conference on Computer Communications (IEEE INFOCOM'22), Virtual Conference, 2022
DyWCP: Dynamic and Lightweight Data-Channel Coupling towards Confidentiality in IoT Security [ PDF ] Shengping Bi, Tao Hou, Tao Wang, Yao Liu, Zhuo Lu, and Qingqi Pei ACM Conference on Security and Privacy in Wireless and Mobile Networks (ACM WiSec'22), San Antonio, Texas, 2022
Undermining Deep Learning Based Channel Estimation via Adversarial Wireless Signal Fabrication Tao Hou, Tao Wang, Zhuo Lu, Yao Liu, and Yalin Sagduyu ACM Workshop on Wireless Security and Machine Learning (ACM WiseML'22), San Antonio, Texas, 2022
IoTGAN: GAN Powered Camouflage Against Machine Learning Based IoT Device Identification [ PDF ] Tao Hou, Tao Wang, Zhuo Lu, Yao Liu, and Yalin Sagduyu IEEE International Symposium on Dynamic Spectrum Access Networks (IEEE DySPAN'21), Virtual Conference, 2021
Combating Adversarial Network Topology Inference by Proactive Topology Obfuscation [ PDF ] Tao Hou, Tao Wang, Zhuo Lu, and Yao Liu IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking (IEEE/ACM ToN), 2021
Binary Code Similarity Detection through LSTM and Siamese Neural Network [ PDF ] Zhengping Luo, Tao Hou, Xiangrong Zhou, Hui Zeng, Zhuo Lu EAI Endorsed Transactions on Security and Safety, 2021
Log Analytics in HPC: A Data-driven Reinforcement Learning Framework [ PDF ] Zhengping Luo, Tao Hou, Tung Thanh Nguyen, Hui Zeng and Zhuo Lu IEEE Conference on Computer Communications (IEEE INFOCOM'20) DDINS Workshop, Toronto, Canada, 2020
ProTO: Proactive Topology Obfuscation Against Adversarial Network Topology Inference [ PDF ] Tao Hou, Zhe Qu, Tao Wang, Zhuo Lu, and Yao Liu IEEE Conference on Computer Communications (IEEE INFOCOM'20), Toronto, Canada, 2020
I Know Your Activities Even When Data Is Encrypted: Smart Traffic Analysis via Fusion Deep Neural Network [ PDF ] [ Poster ] Tao Hou, Tao Wang, Zhuo Lu, and Yao Liu Annual Computer Security Applications Conference (ACSA ACSAC'19), Poster Session, San Juan, Puerto Rico, 2019
Smart Spying via Deep Learning: Inferring Your Activities from Encrypted Wireless Traffic [ PDF ] [ Slides ] Tao Hou, Tao Wang, Zhuo Lu, and Yao Liu IEEE Global Conference on Signal and Information Processing (IEEE GlobalSIP'19), Ottawa, Canada, 2019 Best Paper Award
Autonomous Security Mechanisms for High-Performance Computing Systems: Review and Analysis [ PDF ] Tao Hou, Tao Wang, Dakun Shen, Zhuo Lu, and Yao Liu Adaptive Autonomous Secure Cyber Systems, Springer, 2018
Signal Entanglement based Pinpoint Waveforming for Location-restricted Service Access Control [ PDF ] Tao Wang, Yao Liu, Tao Hou, Qingqi Pei, and Song Fang IEEE Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing (IEEE TDSC), 2016
Location-restricted Services Access Control Leveraging Pinpoint Waveforming [ PDF ] [ Video Demo ] Tao Wang, Yao Liu, Qingqi Pei, and Tao Hou ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (ACM CCS'15), Denver, Colorado, 2015

Teaching

Cryptography and Data Security, Guest Lecturer
Intro to Database, Teaching Assistant
Database Design, Teaching Assistant

Paper Reviewers

IEEE CCNCPS 2017
IEEE CNS 2017, 2018
ACM CCS-MTD 2017
ACM WiseML 2019, 2022
IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking (ToN)
International Journal of Security and Networks (IJSN)
Journal of Computer Security
IEEE Communications Letters

IEEE ICCCN 2022
IEEE SmartGridComm 2017
IEEE ICC 2018, 2019
IEEE GlobalSIP 2019
MILCOM 2019
IEEE Access
IEEE Transactions on Information Forensics & Security (TIFS)
IEEE Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing (TDSC)

Program Committee

IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications and Networks (ICCCN) 2022
ACM EuroSys conference (EuroSys) Artifacts 2021
Annual Computer Security Applications Conference (ACSAC) Artifacts 2020

Awards

IEEE GlobalSIP Best Paper Award
ACSAC'19 Student Travel Grant
USF International Travel Grant
USENIX Security'18 Student Grant
Outstanding Thesis (Jilin University)

ACM WiSec 2022 Student Travel Grant
IEEE S&P'20 Student Registration Award
NeTS Early Career Workshop Travel Grant
Black Hat USA 2018 Student Scholarship
Provincial-Level Merit Student

Professional Memberships

Student member of IEEE
Student member of ACM
Member of Tau Beta Pi, the engineering honor society