“Exploring Power Network Signatures for Information Forensics”

Location: LTS Auditorium, 8080 Greenmead Drive

Speaker:
Min Wu
UMIACS and UMD Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

Abstract:
Osama bin Laden’s video propaganda prompted many information forensic questions: given a video under question, when and where was it shot? Was the audio captured together at the same time/location as the visual? Similar questions about time, location and the integrity of multimedia and other sensor recordings are important to provide evidence and trust in crime solving, journalism, and other informational operations.

An emerging line of research toward addressing these questions exploits novel signatures induced by the power network. An example is the small random fluctuations of the electricity frequency known as the Electric Network Frequency (ENF), owing to the dynamic control process to match the electricity supplies with the demands in the grid. These environmental signatures reflect the attributes and conditions of the power grid and become naturally embedded into various types of sensing signals. They carry time and location information, and may facilitate integrity verification of the primary sensing data.

This talk will summarize recent information forensics research on ENF carried out by our UMD Media and Security Team (MAST), and discuss ongoing and open research issues in and beyond security applications.

Bio:
Min Wu is an ADVANCE Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and a Distinguished Scholar-Teacher at UMD.

She leads the UMD Media and Security Team. Her research focuses on information security and forensics and multimedia signal processing.

Wu has received numerous awards, including an NSF CAREER award, a TR100 Young Innovator Award, an ONR Young Investigator Award, and a UMD Invention of the Year Award. She is also an IEEE Fellow.

Wu chaired the IEEE Technical Committee on Information Forensics and Security, and served as vice president - finance of the IEEE Signal Processing Society and founding chief editor of the IEEE SigPort initiative. She is editor-in-chief of IEEE Signal Processing Magazine and an IEEE Distinguished Lecturer.

Wu received her doctoral degree in electrical engineering from Princeton University.