-
Journey of two years, learnings of a lifetime – My Precog Experience
I remember first hearing about Precog and PK back in 2015 when I was seeking admission to IIIT Delhi. For a freshman in an institute with most of its faculty being graduates from the most prestigious universities around the world, Precog seemed to be one of its crown jewels: headed by a CMU graduate, doing socially relevant work, having several laurels to its name, its members at top places around the world, and as expected being super competitive to get into. As overwhelming as this seemed to me then, I always wanted to work hard, do projects and build my profile so that I can later try and make an…
-
Why PreCog, you ask?
I am writing this blog after spending more than two life-changing-years at PreCog – I joined in December 2016 as an intern and “graduated” as a Research Associate (RA) earlier this year. In my previous blog, I tried to capture my experience as an intern. As an RA, I thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to initiate and lead the WhatsApp Misinformation/WhatsFarzi project with some amazing undergrads. Much of the technical details can be found in another blog. It feels extremely satisfying to share that the project I worked on as an intern got published as a full paper at ACM WebScience 2018, and WhatsFarzi got some cool media coverage (ToI article)…
-
Precog: The Extraordinary Voyage
I am writing this blog after an exhilarating experience of 3 years spent at Precog. When I started my undergrad four years ago, little could I imagine that I’ll be conducting high impact research, building real-world systems, writing and publishing papers and even presenting them at top conferences across the globe. The freshman version of me just wanted to get a decent paying job! Yet 4 years later, here I am headed to pursue a Ph.D. in Computer Science at the University of Maryland, College Park and Max Planck Institute for Software Systems under the Maryland-Max Planck joint program. A good part of who I am today, professionally and academically,…
-
MIME: A Social Network for Meme Enthusiasts. A course project turned into 10,000+ Lines of Code.
Memes have become a predominant means of expression in the Internet culture, they are not only used as a means of entertainment but as an important tool for advertising, spreading propaganda and even political ideologies. However, the creation of memes is limited to a niche community of content creators who are skilled in photo/video editing software. MIME is a platform which empowers people who lack these skills to become a part of the meme conversation. We built a one-stop solution for all meme needs – a maker space where people can create memes, a personalized meme feed, and a space to connect with other meme enthusiasts. Further, we hypothesize that…
-
WhatsFarzi: Analyzing Fake / Manipulated content / Misinformation on WhatsApp
As mobile coverage penetrates the most remote areas and data packages become cheaper every day, over 4 billion people across the world today have access to the Internet, of which more than 56% traffic comes from mobile devices. This is especially true in developing countries like India, where more than 430 million Indians out of the total online population of 462 million access the Internet through mobile phones. WhatsApp is the most popular personal messaging service in India, with more than 200 million users, the highest in the world. One of the biggest side effects of WhatsApp’s deep penetration is its misuse as a medium to disseminate misinformation. Last year,…
-
The Precog Land
All members of Precog are destined to achieve their dreams. Precog not only helps to actualize our goals but dares us to think beyond what we believe is “possible”. Under the dynamic leadership of Prof. Ponnurangam Kumaraguru (“PK”), the Alumni of Precog have been able to get into the world’s best universities and secure jobs in the most sought after companies. I joined Precog in the Summer of 2016 as an Intern – to explore the field of Security and Privacy. I realized that Precog was much more than working on individual projects rather a community where we brainstormed about fresh research ideas. Every week we used to get together in…
-
A Epistle open letter to Precog, PK & RK
Dear Precog,PK & RK, Because we together had written lines and lines on Latex, so now its high time to revise, relive and revive something ‘unread’ between those lines. Hold a cup of coffee and have a flashback 😉 So Let me start with day zero when I got the first glance of your presence, it was one fine afternoon while exploring things around Higher studies and research opportunities I came across NPTEL Course – Privacy and Security in Online Social Media, which was obviously fascinating for me because I am a person who likes to live one life on planet Called Social Media. After getting in to course my…
-
Life on the 4th Floor
For people who’ve known me all through my stint at IIIT-Delhi, the title of this blog should come as no surprise. I was infamous for spending a good portion (read: majority) of my time sitting in/around the 4th floor of the (old) Academic building to the extent that I have been called ‘4th floor boy’ at multiple points. The 4th floor of the Old Academic Building was home to the Precog lab (at the time) and was the primary reason for me spending most of my waking hours in this part of campus. While this may seem excessive (also slightly exaggerated), I can confidently say that my time at Precog…
-
This is Why I Love My #ProfGiri #3
Once again it is that time of the academic year when all graduating students and Research Associates are moving / moved on to the next phase in their life; starting work or grad school in India or flying off to some grad school outside India. It is super gratifying to see students achieve their goals, and more satisfying to play a role in the process. Below is the list of students (arranged in alphabetical order of last name) who have spent significant amount of time working with me this year / last 2 years or more / who are graduating with me or I have written a Letters of Recommendation…
-
Projects, Methodology, Results, and Blogs. Privacy and Security in Online Social Media @ IIITH
Continuing the tradition of capturing project ideas, methodologies, results, and artefacts from the course in a blog, here are the projects from the Fall 2018 edition of PSOSM @ IIITH. For Fall 2017 edition @ IIITD, please visit here. I taught TM18004: Privacy and Security in Online Social Media in Fall 2018 semester. This is my 1st full time teaching experience at IIIT Hyderabad. It was super exciting to teach as a faculty in the same institute where I had taken courses (in 2003 / 2004). It now makes most sense to me why faculty who teach at their alum institutes take so much pride, I have so many friends…