Welcome to Beyond Defense Lab
News: We are attending the 47th IEEE Aerospace Conference in Big Sky, Montana! Come say hi!
We are a dynamic research group in the Department of Computer Science at the University of New Mexico. We focus on advancing cybersecurity and privacy in digital ecosystems.
Our primary goal is to understand malicious activity on the Internet and its societal impact. We envision facilitating secure technology adoption by defending against malicious applications, enabling safe use of privacy-assuring tools, establishing informed trust in digital systems, and ensuring secure adoption of emerging communication technologies. To achieve this, we leverage malware analysis, vulnerability management, and threat intelligence to identify system weaknesses, develop new threat models, and build robust defense systems against evolving attack vectors.
Our research spans mobile, web, and space systems, contributing to the security and privacy of critical infrastructures.
Our students also organize the LoboSec CTF group, fostering hands-on cybersecurity skills through capture-the-flag competitions.
We are looking for passionate new PhD students, and student summer interns to join the team (more info) !
March 2026: Jack and Afsah are traveling to IEEE Aerospace Conference 2026 in Big Sky, Montana! Jack will be presenting our work on supply chain-based malware threats to small satellites. Please reach out if you want to meet us there!
February 2026: Enrique, Ramsha, and Afsah will be attending NDSS in San Diego. We will be presenting our work on auditing the security and privacy of mobile VPNs. Please reach out if you want to meet us there!
February 2026: We hosted Dr. Kevin Butler (University of Florida) at UNM. Dr. Butler delivered a talk on “Exploring Unanticipated Functionality in the Mobile Ecosystem and Beyond”.
January 2026: Congratulations Enrique and Ramsha for receiving the NDSS Fellowship!
January 2026: Danish has been featured by Computing Research Association (CRA)! Read more
January 2026: Our paper on privacy leaks from SMS-delivered URLs is gaining media traction. Read the full paper here.
November 2025: Paper on “Silent Subversion: Sensor Spoofing Attacks via Supply Chain Implants in Satellite Systems” accepted at The 47th IEEE Aerospace Conference 2026. This work resulted in vulnerability disclosures and has been acknowledged by NASA. Congratulations Jack!
October 2025: Our space security efforts got featured in SecurityAffairs and SCWorld. Check the Arxived version here!
September 2025: We officially registered LoboSec as a student-led CTF group at UNM. Please join, if you are interested.
