As artificial intelligence (AI) has become increasingly ubiquitous across domains, the need for it to be reliably secure has only grown. Yet in many ways, ensuring the security of AI agents is fundamentally different from the cybersecurity challenges of the past. To address this growing challenge, the U.S. Center for AI Standards and Innovation (CAISI), housed within the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) at the Department of Commerce, released a Request for Information (RFI) on practices and methodologies for measuring and improving the secure development and deployment of AI agent systems. The Computing Community Consortium (CCC) and Computing Research Association (CRA) recently submitted a response to this RFI, […]

Research that helps mitigate risk to vulnerable populations online — helping to avoid experiences like cyberstalking or digital exploitation — is essential work for making technology safer for everyone. SARU (supporting at-risk users) research requires precautions that minimize harm to participants, but that same work can also pose risks to researchers themselves. It’s therefore essential that researchers have institutional support that promotes their wellbeing when undertaking this work, and that often begins with a proactive and reliable research lead or mentor. To help guide senior researchers in this field on how to lead in their labs and on campus, the Computing Community Consortium (CCC) has published a new brief: Leading […]

Research into how to support at-risk users (SARU research) of technology ultimately helps protect all users. It helps us understand widespread and deeply impactful issues such as cyberstalking, online harassment, and digital exploitation. Yet such research can itself pose risks to participants, researchers, and more. These risks make it all the more important to strategically plan SARU research projects, beginning with purposefully selecting a research problem. The Computing Community Consortium has released a new brief, titled The Problem of Problem Selection, to help researchers in the beginning of their journey into SARU research. This new brief is an outcome of the December 2024 visioning workshop Supporting At-Risk Users Through Responsible Computing. […]

In a new workshop report published by the Computing Community Consortium (CCC), Grand Challenges for the Convergence of Computational and Citizen Science Research, experts across disciplines examine the ways in which computational science — including artificial intelligence (AI) — and citizen science can mutually enrich each other, fostering increased opportunity for advancement in numerous scientific fields. The report presents a roadmap for maximizing the potential of citizen science through the contributions of AI — and vice versa — while also demonstrating the broader applications of this union for challenges across ecological, infrastructural, clinical, and other domains. “We are entering a brave new world where we are renegotiating the relationship between […]

CCC submitted a response to a Request for Information (RFI) released by Networking and Information Technology Research and Development (NITRD), National Coordination Office (NCO), and National Science Foundation (NSF) on the 2023 Federal Cybersecurity Research and Development Strategic Plan. CCC previously released a blog about the importance of the RFI, and encouraged the computing community to respond. CCC’s response was written by: Nadya Bliss (Arizona State University)  Elizabeth Bradley (University of Colorado-Boulder)  Randal Burns (Johns Hopkins University)  Thomas M. Conte (Georgia Institute of Technology)  David Danks (University of California San Diego)  Nathan Evans (Arizona State University)  Kevin Fu (Northeastern University)  Haley Griffin (Computing Community Consortium)  William D. Gropp (University of […]

On Friday of last week, the CCC submitted a response to the Request for Information on Digital Assets Research and Development, which was released in January by the OSTP and NSF’s interagency Fast Track Action Committee (FTAC) on Digital Assets Research and Development. The RFI aims to inform a holistic government approach to understanding and regulating digital assets and distributed ledger technology. The response was written by Hank Korth (Lehigh University), Rajmohan Rajaraman (Northeastern University), Catherine Gill (Computing Community Consortium), and Ann Schwartz (Computing Community Consortium).   The term “digital assets” implies a financial application of the term, but digital assets actually have a much broader meaning. Digital assets refer […]