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Picture of Ning Dr. Ning Zhang, BSc (Wireless Communications, Dalian Marine University), PhD (Network Simulation, Kent)

Contact Details

School of Computer Science,
University of Manchester,
2.113 Kilburn Building,
Oxford Road, MANCHESTER,
M13 9PL, UK.
Voice: +44 (0) 161 275 6117
Fax:   +44 (0) 161 275 6204

I specialise in Communication & Computer Networks and Network/Distributed System Security.

Research Interests

  • Design of security solutions and protocols for networked/distributed applications.
  • E-/M-commerce security: the protection of important electronic documents such as contracts and bank records, transported over networks, against false denial of their transmission or reception; secure signing of contracts over networks to prevent any fraud; designing protocols and mechanisms for secure payments to support networked multimedia information distribution.
  • Composition of communication protocols, such as those for authentication and access control, to accomplish secure inter-operations among different systems on networks.
  • Security in mobile/ubiquitous computing: the designs of security framework, architectures and protocols suited to mobile communication and ubiquitous computing environments.

I am currently an academic member of the Information Management Group (IMG). Here gives some of my Security Research Activities. I was previously an academic member of the Mobile System Architecture (MSA) Group. More research activities/interests of the previous group can be found at MSA Group Research Activities. In addition, I am also a member of the E-Science North West (ESNW) Centre working on e-Grid Security, and a member of the e-Security Centre - a collaborative venture between the Universities of Manchester and Kent.

I sit on the International Program Committees for the following conferences:

  • Information Assurance and Security - IAS 2004 and IAS 2005, Special Tracks of the International Conferences on Information Technology: Coding and Computing (ITCC 2004 and ITCC 2005), sponsored by IEEE Computer Society.
  • ACM Symposium on Applied Computing 2005 (SAC2005).
  • The First International Workshop on Security in Ubiquitous Computing Systems, Dec. 6 - 9, 2005, at Nagasaki, Japan.
  • ACM Symposium on Applied Computing 2005 (SAC2006).
  • 2nd IEEE Workshop on Digital Rights Management Impact on Consumer Communications, January 2006, Las Vegas, USA.
  • The Second International Workshop on Security in Ubiquitous Computing Systems, 1-2 August 2006, Korea.
  • The CCNC2006 (Consumer Communications and Networking Conference) DRM (Digital Right Management Workshop (CCNC2006 DRM Workshop).
  • International Wireless Communications & Mobile Computing Conference (IWCMC2006): Computer and Network Security Symposium, Sheraton Wall Centre, Vancouver, Canada, July 3-6, 2006.
  • The 2nd International Workshop on Security in Ubiquitous Computing Systems (SecUbiq-06), part of the 2006 IFIP International Conference on Embedded and Ubiquitous Computing (EUC'2006), 1-4 August 2006, Seoul, Korea.
  • The 2006 International Workshop on Trust (TRUST06), part of the 2006 IFIP International Conference on Embedded and Ubiquitous Computing (EUC'2006), 1-4 August 2006, Seoul, Korea.
  • The International Conference on Wireless Algorithms, Systems, and Applications (WASA2006), August 15-18, 2006, Xi'an, China.
  • The Second International Conference on High Performance Computing and Communications (HPCC-06) - the Pervasive Computing Application & Security Services Session, Munich, Germany, September 13-15, 2006.
  • The 1st International Conference on Communications and Networking, – the Networking Security and Information Assurance Track, Beijing, China, Oct 25-27, 2006.
  • The International Workshop on Privacy and Security in Mobile HealthCare, Innsbruck, Austria, November 29th, 2006.
  • The 7th IEEE International Conference on Grid Computing (Grid 2006), Barcelona, September 28-29, 2006.
  • 1st International Workshop on Smart Home (IWSH2006), November 10-11, 2006, Cheju Island, Korea.
  • The 3rd IEEE International Workshop on Digital Right Management Impact on Consumer Communications (CCNC 2007 DRM Workshop), January 11, 2007, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA.
  • The 22nd Annual ACM Symposium on Applied Computing 2007 (SAC2007), Seoul, Korea, March 11-15, 2007.
  • The Application and Security Service in Intelligent Environments'07 (ASSIE'07) Workshop, the International Conference on Computational Science (ICCS07), May 27-30, 2007, Beijing, China.
  • The 2007 International Workshop on Service, Security and its Data management technologies in Ubi-Com (SSDU-07), Nanjing, China, 22-25 May, 2007.
  • The 4th International Conference on Autonomic and Trusted Computing (ATC-07), Hong Kong, China, July 11-13, 2007.
  • The International Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing Conference 2007 (IWCMC 07), August 12-16, 2007, at Turtle Bay Resort, Honolulu, Hawaii.
  • The 2nd International Conference on Communications and Networking (Chinacom07) – the Networking Security and Information Assurance Track, August 15-17, 2007, Shanghai, China.
  • The 2nd International Workshop on Trustworthiness, Reliability and services in Ubiquitous and Sensor neTworks (TRUST 2007) in conjunction with EUC2007 (The 2007 IFIP International Conference on Embedded and Ubiquitous Computing), Dec. 17-20, 2007, Taiwan.
  • The 4th IEEE International Workshop on Digital Right Management Impact on Consumer Communications (CCNC 2007 DRM Workshop), 12 January 2008, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA.
  • The 4th Information Security Practice and Experience Conference (ISPEC 2008), 21-23 April 2008, Sydney, Australia.
  • The First Workshop on Security, Trust and Privacy in Grid Environments (STPG2008), in conjunction with the 8th IEEE International Symposium on Cluster Computing and the Grid (CCGRID2008), 19-22 May 2008, Lyon, France, http://ccgrid2008.ens-lyon.fr.
  • The 13th Australasian Conference on Information Security and Privacy (ACISP 2008), 14-16 July 2008, Wollongong, Australia.
  • The IEEE International Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing Conference 2008 (IEEE IWCMC 2008), August 6-8, 2008, Crete Island, Greece.
  • The 3rd International Symposium on Trustworthiness, Reliability and Services in Ubiquitous and Sensor Networks (Trust 2008), December 17-20th, Shanghai, China.
  • An international advisory board member: the 5th International Conference on Information Assurance and Security, Xi'an City, China, 18-20 Aug, 2009 (IAS2009).
  • The 4th International Conference on Communications and Networking (CHINACOM 2009) – the Networking Security and Information Security Symposium, August 26-28, 2009, Xi’an, China.
  • The First International Conference on Next Generation Wireless Systems (NGWS 2009), Oct 12-14, 2009, Melbourne, Australia.
  • International Workshop on Wireless Multimedia Computing and Security Services (WIMUCS 2009) in conjunction with CSA 2009, held in Jeju Island, Korea.
  • The 2009 FTRG International Workshop on Advances in Cryptography, Security and Applications (ACSA-09) to be held on 11-12th December, 2009, in Jeju, Korea.

I have also served as an International Peer Reviewer for the HEA Programme for Research in Third Level Institutions (the PRTLI Programme) in Ireland.

I also serve as an associate editor for the Communication System and Security Track of the JIPS (Journal of Information Processing Systems), published by Korea Information Processing Society; since 2009; an editor for the journal: Journal of Information Assurance and Security (JIAS) , and a general co-chair of the Third International Symposium on Information Assurance and Security (IAS07). I was also a co-chair of the LoA-RG (Authentication Levels of Assurance - Research Group) of the OGF (Open Grid Forum).

Here lists my recent publications.

Recent Grants/External Funded Research Projects and Activities

FIDES Project funded under the EPSRC/DTI MI Programme: Principle Investigator; Grant Duration: 36 months (01/01/2002-31/12/2004); Total Grant Value: £743,824 (£191,824 to this University, and £552,000 to our industrial partner); Funding Body: EPSRC/DTI (LINK, GR/R55177).

The FAME-Permis (Flexible Access Middleware Extensions to Permis) project is funded under the Core Middleware Programme by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC); one of the Principle Investigators; collaboratively undertaken by the University of Manchester and the University of Kent; Project duration: 01/01/2005 – 31/12/2006; Total grant value: £161,621. For more details on this project, click this link: FAME-PERMIS.

CLEF-Services (Clinical E-Science Framework II) project is led by Professor Alan Rector, and funded by MRC (Medical Research Council); Project duration: 01/01/2005 – 31/12/2007. The project is a continuation of the CLEF project. I am involved in Security and Privacy aspects of the project. For more details on this project along with other e-Science projects, click this link: E-Science Projects.

Manchester StMary Hospital Genetic Lab Pilot Project: I do consultancy work to this project - responsible for designing, and supervising the implementation of, identity pseudonym mechanisms to facilitate genetic data sharing without compromising patients' privacy.

SHEBANGS: Shibboleth Enabled Bridge to Access the National Grid Service; jointly with Stephen Pickles; November, 2005 – November, 2006; £39,940 funded by JISC.

The ES-LoA (E-infrastructure Security: Levels of Assurance) project: I am the Principal Investigator and Project Manager of this project. Co-investigators are Prof Carole Goble, Prof. Alan Rector, and Stephen Pickles and Ross MacIntyre from Manchester Computing; November, 2006 – November, 2007; £160,000 funded by JISC.

A Pilot Electronic Multi-Agency Information Sharing (MAIS) System for Mentally Disordered Offenders; in collaboration with Dr J. Senior from Ashworth Hospital; 1st Jan 2009 – 31st Dec 2010 (duration 24 months); £364,783 funded by NHS National Institute for Health Research.

For more details on these and other projects, click this link: External Funded Research Projects.

Research opportunities

If you are interested in carrying out research in one of the above areas then you can apply to the School for PhD study. Students with an excellent undergraduate record will be considered for funding. You are welcome to contact me (via ning.zhang@manchester.ac.uk) for informal discussions.

Current Supervised Research Students/Projects

  • Clara Corzo - Preventing Authorised Users from the Abuse and Misuse of Permissions in an E-banking System (PhD);
  • Li Yao - RA for the MAIS project (PhD);
  • Naikuo Yang - Security Model Formal Verification (jointly with Prof. Howard Barringer);
  • Ali Ahmed - Context-aware Security in Ubicomputing (PhD);
  • Kitisak Osathanunkul - Mobile Ad hoc Network Security (PhD);
  • Tarek Gaber - Digital Rights Management (PhD);
  • Mengchang Liu - Privacy-preserving Distributed Data Computation (PhD);

Supervised PhD/MPhil Research Students/Projects

  • Dr Lisha He - Thesis Title: An Asymmetrical End-to-End Mobile Payment Protocol for M-Commerce (PhD); Awarded 2005.
  • Dr Delia Critchlow - Thesis Title: User Privacy and Accountable Anonymity for M-commerce Transactions; Delia has won the School's 2003 Best Paper Award; Awarded 2005.
  • Dr Aleksandra Nenadic - Thesis Title: A Security Solution for Fair Exchange and Non-repudiation in E-Commerce; Awarded 2005.
  • Dr Omaima Bamasak - Thesis Title: Delegating Signing Power to Mobile Agents: Algorithms and Protocol Designs. Omaima has won the Best Paper Award given by the IEEE Computer Society in the IEEE ISCC04 conference; She has also won the School's 2004 Best Paper Award; Awarded 2006.
  • Dr Ian Featherstone - Thesis Title: Quality of Service in Hybrid Wireless IP Networks; Awarded 2006.
  • Jay Sean Chin - Thesis Title: Context-constrained Authorisation Architecture for Pervasive Grid Computing (MPhil); Awarded 2007.

Teaching

I have taught or teach part or whole of the following UG and PG courses:
  • CS30082-Network Security;
  • CS60391-Computer Security;
  • CS6024-Mobile Computing (MSc) and CS20081-Communication and Computer Networks - the modules I used to teach.

Administrative Duties

  • PG Admission Officer for India Section;
  • Dept Disability Co-ordinator.