To scientists, the “Why am I seeing this?” function is particularly important for understanding how the Facebook system is used or misused, says one of the authors, professor Alan Mislove of Boston’s Northeastern University. “It’s one of the few transparency mechanisms they have,” he says. “Credit where credit’s due. We certainly appreciate that they’re doing […]

In lieu of congressional action on user data privacy, the FTC has had to serve as the last line of defense in protecting personal information online. That has become increasingly difficult now that almost every industry relies on consumer data obtained online to inform its decisions — resulting in more instances of hacks and breaches […]

To counter these threats, we need to take practical steps limiting the exposure of critical infrastructure to cyberattacks. Although there is no hope of providing complete protection, we can do better than at present. In an interview, Robert K. Knake, a former Obama administration official now at Northeastern University, made three useful suggestions.

“My school will now always be remembered for what took place on Feb. 14, 2018,” said Leslie Chiu, a graduate of Stoneman Douglas who attends Northeastern University. In one poignant moment, Leonor Muñoz, a survivor of the Feb. 14 shooting that killed 17 people, was joined on stage by her sister, Beca, a Northeastern student.

Researchers have attempted to categorize hate crimes in hopes of understanding what makes them manifest. Jack Levin and Jack McDevitt at Northeastern University published a study detailing several types of hate crimes, including retaliatory hate crimes that are provoked by a previous perceived hate crime or act of terrorism. Incidents like the Rodney King verdict […]

While it looks like a steep climb for the Democrats, Michael Dukakis, the former Massachusetts governor who teaches political science at Northeastern University, says anybody can be beaten — even Charlie Baker.

According to a recent survey commissioned by Northeastern University, only 3% of GenZers view political leaders as role models. And although less than a third of these estimated 78 million Americans will be old enough to vote in this year’s midterms, a politically engaged generation that has little to no tolerance for the semantically empty […]

Try not to click on any links within an email, said Engin Kirda, professor at the College of Computer and Information Science at Northeastern University. “If you can avoid this, you will be much safer against attacks,” Kirda said.

Northeastern University criminologist James Alan Fox says social media scanning brings up another set of problems for law enforcement and school administrators.

Alan Mislove studies algorithms. Recently, his research at Northeastern University, in Boston, has shown that Facebook’s software was leaking users’ phone numbers to advertisers. He has also found new ways to audit that same software for racial bias. But work like his faces challenges. Scraping data from public-facing websites often sails close to breaching their […]