السلام عليكم ورحمه الله وبركاته

Mahmoud Hammad, PhD
Associate Professor

Ajman University
College of Engineering and Information Technology
Departmeent of Information Technology
Office: Building J2
Email: m.hammad"AT"ajman"DOT"au"DOT"ae ; hammadm"AT"uci"DOT"edu

Dr. Mahmoud Hammad is an Associate Professor in the Department of Information Technology within the College of Engineering and Information Technology at Ajman University. Before joining Ajman University, Dr. Hammad worked as Associate Professor in the Software Engineering Department within the Computer and Information Technology School at the Jordan University of Science and Technology (JUST). He also served as the director of the Center for E-Learning and Open Educational Resources at JUST. Hammad's research interests are in the field of software engineering, specifically in the area of software architecture, self-adaptive software systems, mobile computing, software analysis, software security, natural language processing and machine learning. Hammad received his Ph.D. in Software Engineering from the University of California, Irvine (UCI) under the supervision of Prof. Sam Malek . During his Ph.D., Hammad developed a self-protecting Android software system , an Android software system that can monitor itself and adapt (change) its behavior at runtime to keep the system secure and protected from Inter-Component Communication attacks at all times.

Hammad received his M.S. in Software Engineering from George Mason University, VA, USA and B.S. in Computer Science from Yarmouk University, Jordan . Hammad is a member of the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM), ACM Special Interest Group on Software Engineering (SIGSOFT), and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).

Mahmoud's image

Education

  • Ph.D. in Software Engineering
    University of California, Irvine, USA
    GPA: 4.0
    July, 2015 - August, 2018
  • M.S. in Software Engineering
    George Mason University, USA
    GPA: 3.93
    January, 2012 - December, 2013
  • B.S. in Computer Science
    Yarmouk University, Irbid, Jordan
    GPA: 3.76
    October 2001 - August 2005

Projects

  • SALMA: Self-Protection of Android Systems from Inter-Component Communication Attacks

    The current security mechanisms for Android apps, both static and dynamic analysis approaches, are insufficient for detection and prevention of the increasingly dynamic and sophisticated security attacks. Static analysis approaches suffer from false positives whereas dynamic analysis approaches suffer from false negatives. Moreover, they all lack the ability to efficiently analyze systems with incremental changes---such as adding/removing apps, granting/revoking permissions, and dynamic components' communications.
    Each time the system changes, the entire analysis needs to be repeated, making the existing approaches inefficient for practical use. To mitigate their shortcomings, we have developed SALMA, a novel self-protecting Android software system that monitors itself and adapts its behavior at runtime to prevent a wide-range of security risks.

    ⛁ Resources:
    Project website

Publications

Contributions in the areas of mobile security, software architecture, machine learning, and program analysis.

  • Mahmoud Hammad, Joshua Garcia, and Sam Malek. SALMA: Self-Protection of Android Systems from Inter-Component Communication Attacks. The 33rd IEEE/ACM International Conference on Automated Software Engineering (ASE), September 2018, Montpellier, France. (20% acceptance rate) [Paper].
  • Mahmoud Hammad, Joshua Garcia, and Sam Malek. A Large-Scale Empirical Study on the Effects of Code Obfuscations on Android Apps and Anti-Malware Products. International Conference of Software Engineering (ICSE), May 2018, Gothenburg, Sweden. (21% acceptance rate) [Paper].

Experience

Research

  • Graduate Researcher, Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences, University of California, Irvine, 2015 to present
    Research Labs: Software Engineering and Analysis Lab (SEAL)
  • Graduate Researcher, Department of Computer Science, George Mason University, 2014 to 2015
    Research Labs: System Design and Analysis Lab (SDAL)

Teaching

Industry

  • Mobile Developer
    The Helen A. Keller Institute, Fairfax, VA
    2013 to 2014
  • Senior Oracle Application Developer
    Computer and Information Center - Jordan University of science & technology, Irbid, Jordan
    2006 to 2012
  • Software Engineer
    JoVal for IT, Amman, Jordan
    2005 to 2006

Academic Services

PC Member

  • PC Member, Artifact Evaluation Committee, 13th International Symposium on Software Engineering for Adaptive and SelfManaging Systems (SEAMS 2018), Gothenburg, Sweden, May 2018.
  • PC Member, Artifact Evaluation Committee, 12th International Symposium on Software Engineering for Adaptive and SelfManaging Systems (SEAMS 2017),Buenos Aires, Argentina, May 2017.

Curriculum Vitae