Category: Research

European Researchers' Night 2025 / Vísindavaka 2025

Helmut Neukirchen, 10. September 2025

On Saturday, 27. September 2024, 12:00-17:00, there is Vísindavaka 2025, the Icelandic family-friendly-during-daytime edition of European Researchers' Night 2026 at Laugardalshöll.

The Computer Science department of University of Iceland will have booths there, showcasing our research. Watch out for updates and visit our booth.

Gagnabær ("Datatown") digital twin that visualises cyber attacks in Iceland. (Photo from Vísindavaka 2024)


Real-time object detection: AI trained on a supercomputer, but running locally in the browser of your smartphone. (Photo from 2022)

Our booths at the previous European Researchers' Nights:


Parts of this event are in the context of our cybersecurity activities and the ECCC/EU co-funded projects ICEDEF – Defend Iceland and Eyvör – the National Cybersecurity Coordination Centre of Iceland (NCC-IS).


Cybersecurity at the 21st Icelandic HPC Community Workshop

Helmut Neukirchen, 29. August 2025

We presented an update on our cybersecurity activities to industry and students at the 21st Icelandic HPC Community Workshop August 28, 2025.

We covered there the joint MSc. programme in cybersecurity, our research, and the Digital Europe Programme projects Eyvör NCC-IS, the National Coordination Centre for Cybersecurity in Iceland and Defend Iceland, including the European network of NCCs and the European Cybersecurity Competence Centre (ECCC).


This event is in the context of our cybersecurity activities and the ECCC/EU co-funded projects ICEDEF – Defend Iceland and Eyvör – the National Cybersecurity Coordination Centre of Iceland (NCC-IS).


Coalition agreement in Germany: more digital surveillance, but at least IT security gets legal certainty

Helmut Neukirchen, 10. April 2025

The coalition agreement of the new Government that is forming aims at more digital surveillance (e.g. data retention in telecommunication, face and number plate recognition). While this is not good for privacy, at least IT security gets legal certainty:

In the Germany, there is the problem that IT security researchers who report vulnerabilities to companies (Responsible Disclosure) are sometimes sued by these companies based on a German legislation that was supposed to make breaking into IT systems a crime. I signed a petition of IT security researchers to change that legislation in order to prevent that Responsible Disclosure can be made a crime. The hope was that the currently forming government will change legislation and indeed:

The new coalition agreement covers cybersecurity at some places in an abstract manner and also includes the above legislative change:

Cyberstrafrecht, Deepfakes, Strafbarkeit Plattformbetreiber und Hackerparagraph
Wir reformieren das Cyberstrafrecht und schließen Strafbarkeitslücken, zum Beispiel bei bildbasierter sexualisierter Gewalt. Dabei erfassen wir auch Deep Fakes und schließen Lücken bei deren Zugänglichmachung gegenüber Dritten. Wir verschärfen die Sanktionsmöglichkeiten gegenüber Plattformen, insbesondere bei systemischen Mängeln bei der Entfernung strafbarer Inhalte. Wir werden im Computerstrafrecht Rechtssicherheit für IT-Sicherheitsforschung schaffen, wobei wir Missbrauchsmöglichkeiten verhindern.

Research trip/Vísindaferð to the Computer Science department

Helmut Neukirchen, 28. March 2025

Research trip/Vísindaferð is a visit to learn about companies (also as future employers) and to learn about the science behind the products that they develop. Often, these are organised by student associations as a social event.

This time, our student association Nörd visited not a company, but their teachers at the Computer Science department to learn about the research done there -- to get an idea of topics that they could do later as M.Sc. students.

I presented the following short slide deck on Software Engineering research area and the Cybersecurity M.Sc. specialisations.

The above video shows the results of the M.Sc. thesis Design and Implementation of a Buoy Positioning and Monitoring System Using Differential GNSS and LoRaWAN.

Successful PhD defense by Marcel Aach

Helmut Neukirchen, 30. January 2025

Marcel Aach defended yesterday successfully his PhD thesis on Parallel and Scalable Hyperparameter Optimization for Distributed Deep Learning Methods on High-Performance Computing Systems.

Marcel's research was rooted in the CoE RAISE project. This PhD is an example of the collaboration between the Faculty of Industrial Engineering, Mechanical Engineering and Computer Science and Jülich Supercomputing Centre (JSC).

Horizon 2020 Centre of Excellence for Research on AI- and Simulation-Based Engineering at Exascale (RAISE) has six results from University of Iceland recognised as a 'key innovator' on the EU Innovation Radar website.

Helmut Neukirchen, 15. January 2025

It is a great honour that six results from the EU Horizon 2020-funded Centre of Excellence for Research on AI- and Simulation-Based Engineering at Exascale (RAISE) result from University of Iceland were recognised by the EU as a 'key innovator' on the EU Innovation Radar website.

An example is LAMEC (Load AI Modules, Environments and Containers) that generates High-Performance Computing (HPC) job scripts. While job scripts are not rocket science, they are different for each HPC system and, in particular for newcomers, cumbersome to create. Therefore, LAMEC eases this with a few mouse-clicks using a web UI.

Another example is Scalable Hyperparameter Tuning to Accelerate AI Training in Reseach and Industry that directly relates to our PhD research Parallel and Scalable Hyperparameter Optimization for Distributed Deep Learning Methods on High-Performance Computing Systems

In fact, University of Iceland was involved in CoE RAISE and contributed to all of following results that are listed as innovations:

Two cybersecurity papers at the 11th IEEE International Conference on Social Networks Analysis, Management and Security (SNAMS-2024)

Helmut Neukirchen, 7. December 2024

We have two research papers accepted at the 11th IEEE International Conference on Social Networks Analysis, Management and Security (SNAMS-2024).

  • Brynjólfur Stefánsson, Ásta Guðrún Helgadóttir, Martin Nizon-Deladoeuille, Helmut Neukirchen, Thomas Welsh: Understanding Trust in Authentication Methods for Icelandic Digital Public Services. IEEE SNAMS 2024: The 11th IEEE International Conference on Social Networks Analysis, Management and Security, IEEE, to appear 2024 or 2025. Preprint DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.2501.17548
  • Martin Nizon-Deladoeuille, Brynjólfur Stefánsson, Helmut Neukirchen, Thomas Welsh.
    Towards Supporting Penetration Testing Education with Large Language Models: an Evaluation and Comparison. IEEE SNAMS 2024: The 11th IEEE International Conference on Social Networks Analysis, Management and Security, IEEE, to appear 2024 or 2025. Preprint DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.2501.17539

The program lists only paper titles -- not authors nor presenters. Our student Brynjólfur Stefánsson presented both papers at the conference.


This research is in the context of our cybersecurity activities and the ECCC/EU co-funded projects ICEDEF – Defend Iceland and Eyvör – the National Cybersecurity Coordination Centre of Iceland (NCC-IS).


Poster at the 2024 annual conference of Vegagerðin, the Icelandic Road and Coastal Administration

Helmut Neukirchen, 1. November 2024

As part of our IoT for buoys research, we had on 1. November 2024 a poster at the 2024 annual conference of Vegagerðin, the Icelandic Road and Coastal Administration.

Click on the poster image for the full size PDF of the poster.

European Researchers' Night 2024 / Vísindavaka 2024

Helmut Neukirchen, 27. September 2024

On Saturday, 28. September 2024, 13:00-18:00, there is Vísindavaka 2024, the Icelandic family-friendly-during-daytime edition of European Researchers' Night 2024 at Laugardalshöll.

The Computer Science department of University of Iceland has a booth there, showcasing some of their research:

  • Cybersecurity: Eyvör NCC-IS, the National Coordination Centre Iceland for Cybersecurity and Defend Iceland. The Computer Science department of University of Iceland is part of Eyvör NCC-IS and we will show three pieces to raise awareness:
    • Has my user info (in the worst case: my password) been leaked? Look up who else owns your login data: https://haveibeenpwned.com
      Note: if your data shows up there to have been leaked, then this is not your fault, but the fault of the website that was storing your data in an insecure manner and you should change your password at that website (also check whether the password has been leaked or only, e.g., your email adress). However, it is your fault if you use the same password for multiple websites: should your password leak from one website, criminals will try that password on other websites and will have success if you use the same password there. Use different passwords for different services. Even better: use multifactor authentication, i.e. not just a password (that can be easily leaked), but in addition something that can be less easily stolen, such as your phone: an authenticator app running on it, an SMS sent to your phone number, or the Icelandic digital ID on your SIM card.
    • An online quiz on how good you are at identifying phishing emails, i.e. emails trying to trick you into providing information, e.g. passwords: https://cybersecuritymonth.eu/quiz (Note: solutions not provided online -- you need to visit us to get hints where you were wrong and where you were right!)
    • A LEGO model of Iceland representing critical infrastructure that is subject to attacks. Each time, a service on our Internet-connected computer is attacked via the Internet from anywhere in the world, a light goes off. So when all Iceland turns dark in our Lego model, then you know that all of our services are currently being attacked at the same time. We use just a dummy sample server, but in fact, it could be your computer or a power plant that is attacked. True Blinkenlights - next time, we should do it using the lights in the glass front of Harpa concert hall.


  • A 3D scanner that scans the shape of your ear: used in CoE RAISE in order to find with AI out how the shape of your ear influences how you hear from different directions.
  • Quantum computing: a new piece to show, therefore no photos yet -- you really need to come and see!

See you at Laugardalshöll!

Official Eyvör NCC-IS kickoff

Helmut Neukirchen, 4. April 2024

While Eyvör – the National Cybersecurity Coordination Centre of Iceland (NCC-IS) has in fact started earlier, we had today the official public kick off meeting. An excerpt of the agenda is below:

We presented there the Cybersecurity research and education that is jointly done at University of Iceland and Reykjavik University. I gave the presentation on our Cybersecurity M.Sc. programmes.


Eyvör – the National Cybersecurity Coordination Centre of Iceland (NCC-IS) is co-funded by the ECCC/EU.