Yaron Singer
Yaron Singer | |
|---|---|
| Alma mater | University of California, Berkeley (PhD) |
| Awards | Sloan Research Fellowship (2018) NSF CAREER Award |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Computer science, machine learning, algorithms, optimization |
| Institutions | Harvard University Robust Intelligence Cisco Systems |
| Christos Papadimitriou | |
Yaron Singer is a computer scientist and entrepreneur whose research has focused on algorithms, machine learning, optimization, and the security of artificial intelligence systems.[1] He was the Gordon McKay Professor of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics at Harvard University and co-founded Robust Intelligence, where he served as CEO.[2][3][4] Cisco acquired Robust Intelligence in 2024.[5] Singer is vice president of AI and security at Cisco's Foundation AI group.[6][7]
Education and academic career
[edit]Singer earned a PhD in computer science from the University of California, Berkeley in 2011. His dissertation, Incentives, Computation, and Networks: Limitations and Possibilities of Algorithmic Mechanism Design, was supervised by Christos Papadimitriou.[8]
Before joining Harvard, Singer was a postdoctoral researcher at Google Research.[1] Harvard appointed him full professor with tenure in 2020.[1] He later held the Gordon McKay Professorship of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics. Singer left his professorship in 2023 and remains affiliated with Harvard as an associate in computer science.[4][2]
Research
[edit]Singer's doctoral research was in algorithmic mechanism design, including the computational limits of truthful mechanisms and the design of mechanisms subject to a fixed budget.[8][9][10]
With Eric Balkanski, Singer developed algorithms for submodular optimization that evaluated multiple candidates in parallel, reducing the number of sequential steps needed to find a solution.[11][12][13]
Singer has also studied adversarial machine learning, including how small changes to inputs can alter a model's predictions and how to make models more resistant to such attacks.[14][3]
Robust Intelligence and Cisco
[edit]Singer co-founded Robust Intelligence and served as its CEO. The company developed software for finding vulnerabilities in machine learning systems and blocking problematic inputs.[3]
Cisco announced an agreement to acquire Robust Intelligence in August 2024 and completed the acquisition the following month.[5] At Cisco, Singer became vice president of AI and security at Foundation AI.[6][7]
Recognition
[edit]Singer was named a Sloan Research Fellow in computer science in 2018.[15] He has also received an NSF CAREER Award, a Google Faculty Research Award, and a Facebook Faculty Award. As a graduate student, he received fellowships from Microsoft Research and Facebook.[1]
In 2012, Singer received the best student paper award at the ACM International Conference on Web Search and Data Mining for How to Win Friends and Influence People, Truthfully: Influence Maximization Mechanisms for Social Networks.[16]
References
[edit]- 1 2 3 4 Burrows, Leah (11 February 2020). "Yaron Singer granted tenure". Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. Harvard University. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
- 1 2 "Yaron Singer". Institute for Quantitative Social Science. Harvard University. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
- 1 2 3 Knight, Will (2 December 2020). "This Company Uses AI to Outwit Malicious AI". Wired. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
- 1 2 Dhanda, Sidhi; Dragoi, Stephanie (24 February 2026). "Harvard's Computer Science Faculty Keep Heading to Industry. SEAS is Trying to Keep a Foot in Both Worlds". The Harvard Crimson. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
- 1 2 Gillis, Tom (26 August 2024). "Fortifying the Future of Security for AI: Cisco Announces Intent to Acquire Robust Intelligence". Cisco Blogs. Cisco Systems. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
- 1 2 "Yaron Singer". Cisco Blogs. Cisco Systems. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
- 1 2 Almekinders, Sander (28 April 2025). "Cisco launches Foundation AI and introduces open-source security AI model". Techzine Global. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
- 1 2 Singer, Yaron (2011). Incentives, Computation, and Networks: Limitations and Possibilities of Algorithmic Mechanism Design (PhD dissertation). University of California, Berkeley. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
- ↑ Papadimitriou, Christos; Schapira, Michael; Singer, Yaron (2008). "On the Hardness of Being Truthful". Proceedings of the 49th Annual IEEE Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science. pp. 250–259. doi:10.1109/FOCS.2008.54.
- ↑ Singer, Yaron (2010). "Budget feasible mechanisms". Proceedings of the 2010 IEEE 51st Annual Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science. pp. 765–774. doi:10.1109/FOCS.2010.78.
- ↑ Balkanski, Eric; Singer, Yaron (2018). "The Adaptive Complexity of Maximizing a Submodular Function". Proceedings of the 50th Annual ACM SIGACT Symposium on Theory of Computing. STOC '18. pp. 1138–1151. doi:10.1145/3188745.3188752.
- ↑ Temming, Maria (16 July 2018). "Solving problems by computer just got a lot faster". Science News. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
- ↑ Choi, Charles Q. (5 July 2018). "New Optimization Algorithm Exponentially Speeds Computation". IEEE Spectrum. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
- ↑ Shaw, Jonathan (6 December 2018). "AI and adversarial attacks". Harvard Magazine. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
- ↑ "Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship for Yaron Singer in Computer Science". Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
- ↑ "WSDM 2012". Web Search and Data Mining 2012. 9 February 2012. Retrieved 24 June 2026.
External links
[edit]- Yaron Singer at the Institute for Quantitative Social Science
- Yaron Singer at Cisco
