Michael Backes

Michael Backes
Born (1978-01-07) 7 January 1978 (age 48)
Academic background
EducationSaarland University
ThesisCryptographically Sound Analysis of Security Protocols (2002)
Birgit Pfitzmann, Harald Ganzinger
Academic work
Main interests
formal methods, cryptography and privacy-enhancing technologies
Websitecispa.saarland/director/

Michael Backes (born 7 January 1978) is a German professor of computer science. He is the founding director and CEO of the CISPA Helmholtz Center for Information Security. He is known for his work on formal methods, cryptography and privacy-enhancing technologies.

Life and career

Born in Germany, he received a diploma degree in computer science and a diploma degree in mathematics from Saarland University in 2001 and 2002, respectively, and obtained his PhD in computer science from Saarland University in 2002 under the supervision of Birgit Pfitzmann and Harald Ganzinger.

He was successively a researcher at IBM Research (2002 – 2005) and associate professor (2005) and professor (2006 – today) of computer science at Saarland University, Germany.

He is the founding director and CEO of the newly funded CISPA Helmholtz Center for Information Security, Germany, since 2018.

His research is concerned with information security and privacy, particularly on security and privacy in machine learning, trustworthy information processing and medical privacy; design, analysis and verification for security-critical systems and services, and universal solutions in software and network security.

On June 22, 2026, he was suspended from his role as director of CISPA under suspicion of espionage and an external review is set to follow.

Awards and honors

Backes has received a number of awards, including the following:

References

  1. ↑ "PET Award". petsymposium.org.
  2. ↑ "Top Research in Privacy Enhancing Technologies Recognized at Toronto Conference". Stories. May 28, 2004.
  3. ↑ "Michael Backes – MPI SWS". www.mpi-sws.org.
  4. ↑ "2008 Faculty Award recipients" (PDF). Retrieved 2024-05-13.
  5. ↑ Review, MIT Technology. "Innovator Under 35: Michael Backes, 31". MIT Technology Review.
  6. ↑ "List of projects invited for funding (alphabetical order)" (PDF). Retrieved 2024-05-13.
  7. ↑ "ERC-2013-Synergy - Grant List of selected Principal Investigators and Project" (PDF). Retrieved 2024-05-13.
  8. ↑ "Professor der Saar-Uni ist jüngstes Mitglied der Deutschen Akademie der Technikwissenschaften". www.uni-saarland.de. August 24, 2019.
  9. ↑ "Launch of 2nd edition of CNIL-INRIA Privacy Award | CNIL". www.cnil.fr.
  10. ↑ "NSA's 5th Annual Best Scientific Cybersecurity Paper Competition Award". National Security Agency | Central Security Service.
  11. ↑ "2019 Fellow Newly Elevated Fellows" (PDF). Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2023-05-08.
  12. ↑ "3 questions à Michael Backes, professeur en informatique et docteur honoris causa 2018 de l'Université de Lorraine | Factuel". factuel.univ-lorraine.fr. 7 September 2018.
  13. ↑ "Michael Backes". awards.acm.org. Retrieved 2024-01-26.