Dr. Christoph
Kerschbaumer
Dr. Christoph Kerschbaumer picture Dr. Christoph Kerschbaumer has over two decades of experience in software engineering and computer security. His work ranges from designing secure systems with fail-safe defaults to fighting cross-site scripting to preventing man-in-the-middle attacks.

Currently he is managing the Firefox Security Engineering team at Mozilla and is mentoring software engineers around the world to reach their full potential.

He received his PhD in Computer Science from the University of California, Irvine, where he focused his research on information flow tracking techniques within web browsers.

Prior to being a graduate research scholar, he received a M.Sc. and B.Sc. in Computer Science from the Technical University Graz, Austria.
Books
  • Beyond the Code - Setting You up for Success as a Software Engineer; 234 pages; ISBN: 979-8875904974; Published February 2024; Available as paperback, hardcover and eBook.
    For detailed information about the book visit:
    https://bytc.info
Publications
Peer Reviewed
SoK: All or Nothing - A Postmortem of Solutions to the Third-Party Script Inclusion Permission Model and a Path Forward; Steven Sprecher, Christoph Kerschbaumer, Engin Kirda; European Symposium on Security and Privacy; Genoa, Italy, June 2022
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HTTPS-Only: Upgrading all connections to https in Web Browsers; Christoph Kerschbaumer, Julian Gaibler, Arthur Edelstein, Thyla van der Merwe; MadWeb - Measurements, Attacks, and Defenses for the Web; San Diego, California, February 2021 (Best Paper Award)
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Hardening Firefox against Injection Attacks; Christoph Kerschbaumer, Tom Ritter, Frederik Braun; SecWeb - Designing Security for the Web; Genova, Italy, September 2020
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Extending the Same Origin Policy with Origin Attributes; Tanvi Vyas, Andrea Marchesini, Christoph Kerschbaumer; International Conference on Information Systems Security and Privacy; Porto, Portugal, February 2017
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Enforcing Content Security by Default within Web Browsers; Christoph Kerschbaumer; International Conference on Cybersecurity Development; Boston, Massachusetts, November 2016
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Injecting CSP for Fun and Security; Christoph Kerschbaumer, Sid Stamm, Stefan Brunthaler; International Conference on Information Systems Security and Privacy; Rome, Italy, February 2016 (Best Paper Award)
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Information Flow Tracking meets Just-In-Time Compilation; Christoph Kerschbaumer, Eric Hennigan, Per Larsen, Stefan Brunthaler, Michael Franz; ACM Transactions on Architecture and Code Optimization, Volume 10, Issue 4, December 2013. Invited to present at the International Conference on High-Performance and Embedded Architectures and Compilers; Vienna, Austria; January 2014
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CrowdFlow: Efficient Information Flow Security; Christoph Kerschbaumer, Eric Hennigan, Per Larsen, Stefan Brunthaler, Michael Franz; Information Security Conference; Dallas, Texas; November 2013
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Towards Precise and Efficient Information Flow Control in Web Browsers; Christoph Kerschbaumer, Eric Hennigan, Per Larsen, Stefan Brunthaler, Michael Franz; International Conference on Trust & Trustworthy Computing; London, United Kingdom; June 2013
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First-Class Labels: Using Information Flow to Debug Security Holes; Eric Hennigan, Christoph Kerschbaumer, Per Larsen, Stefan Brunthaler, Michael Franz; International Conference on Trust & Trustworthy Computing; London, United Kingdom; June 2013
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SlimVM: A Small Footprint Java Virtual Machine for Connected Embedded Systems; Christoph Kerschbaumer, Gregor Wagner, Christian Wimmer, Andreas Gal, Christian Steger, Michael Franz; Conference on the Principles and Practice of Programming in Java; Calgary, Alberta, Canada; August 2009
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Magazines
Can we build a Privacy-Preserving Web Browser we all deserve?; Christoph Kerschbaumer, Luke Crouch, Tom Ritter, Tanvi Vyas; ACM XRDS Magazine, Summer 2018, Volume 24, No. 4
Invited Talks, Workshops, Seminars
Hardening the Firefox Web Browser; NII Shonan Meeting on Web Application Security; Tokyo, Japan; March 2024

The Road to a secure Web; Keynote @ SecWeb - Designing Security for the Web; Virtual Event; September 2021

Hardening the Content Security Landscape of Firefox; Keynote @ German OWASP Day; Karlsruhe, Germany; December 2019

Hardening the Content Security Landscape of Firefox; Mozilla Security Research Summit; Vienna, Austria; November 2019

Preventing Data Exfiltration in the Browser; Mozilla Security Research Summit; San Francisco, California; May 2019

Preventing Data Exfiltration Attempts in the Browser; Mozilla Security Research Summit; London, United Kingdom; November 2018

Enforcing Content Security by Default in Firefox; INRIA; Sophia Antipolis, France; October 2018

Could we use Information Flow Tracking to generate more sophisticated blacklists?; Web Application Security Seminar, Schloss Dagstuhl; Germany; August 2018

Enforcing Security in Firefox; SBA Research; Vienna, Austria; May 2017

Are We Secure Yet? Adversarial thinking to build Secure Systems; Linux Days Graz; Graz, Austria; April 2017

Probabilistic Information Flow Control in Modern Web Browsers; Microsoft Research; Redmond, Washington; January 2015

Information Flow Control in Modern Web Browsers; University of Stanford; California; December 2014

Information Flow in Web Browsers; The SoCal Programing Languages and Systems Workshop; University of California, Santa Barbara, May 2013

Information Flow in Web Browsers; The SoCal Programing Languages and Systems Workshop; University of California, San Diego, December 2011

Bytecode-Based Security for JavaScript; International Conference on Architectural Support for Programming Languages and Operating Systems; Newport Beach, California, March 2011

Bytecode-Based Security for JavaScript; The SoCal Programing Languages and Systems Workshop; University of California, Los Angeles, December 2010
Professional
  • Manager, Firefox Security & (interim) Privacy Engineering (Mozilla), since 2022
  • Manager, Firefox Security Engineering (Mozilla), since 2021
  • Manager, Firefox Security Infrastracture Engineering (Mozilla), since 2020
  • Content Security Tech Lead (Mozilla), since 2017
  • Security and Privacy Engineer (Mozilla), since 2013
  • Graduate Program Firefox OS (Mozilla), 2012
  • Graduate Research Program (Qualcomm), 2011
  • Graduate Research Assistant (UC Irvine), 2010
  • Software Engineer (Bravestone), 2009
  • Software Engineer (TU Graz), 2005
  • Web Developer (Freelance), 2000
Teaching
Invited Lecture at Technical High School Leoben (class of Dr. Christian Schindler), Austria, March 2024

Invited Lecture (video) in the class Introduction to Software Security (Prof. Engin Kirda) at Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts, November 2023

Invited Lecture (video) in the class Foundations of Computer Security & Privacy: Breakthroughs and Research at Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts, March 2023

Invited Lecture (video) in the class Cybersecurity Seminar (Prof. Sid Stamm) at Rose Hulman Institue of Technology, Terre Haute, Indiana, March 2023

Invited Lecture (video) in the class Cybersecurity Seminar (Prof. Sid Stamm) at Rose Hulman Institue of Technology, Terre Haute, Indiana, October 2022

Invited Lecture (video) in the class Language-Based Security (Prof. Andrei Sabelfeld) at Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden, March 2022

Invited Lecture (video) in the class Software Vulnerabilities and Security (Prof. Engin Kirda) at Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts, November 2021

Invited Lecture (video) in the class Language-Based Security (Prof. Andrei Sabelfeld) at Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden, March 2021

Invited Lecture (video) in the class Language-Based Security (Prof. Andrei Sabelfeld) at Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden, May 2020

Invited Lecture in the class Applied Programming at my former High School Commercial & Digitial Business Academy, Liezen, Austria, February 2020

Introduction to Computer Science II, Teaching Assistant, Donald Bren School of Information & Computer Sciences, University of California, Irvine, Winter 2012

Compilers and Interpreters, Teaching Assistant/Reader, Donald Bren School of Information & Computer Sciences, University of California, Irvine, Fall 2011

Compilers and Interpreters, Teaching Assistant/Reader, Donald Bren School of Information & Computer Sciences, University of California, Irvine, Spring 2011

Theses
Probabilistic Information Flow Control in Modern Web Browsers; PhD Thesis, Secure Systems and Software Laboratory, Donald Bren School of Information & Computer Sciences, University of Califorina, Irvine, 2014 (Advisor: Prof. Michael Franz)

SlimVM: A Small Footprint Java Virtual Machine for Connected Embedded Systems; Masters Thesis, Institute for Technical Informatics, Technical University Graz, Austria, 2009
Awards and Honors
Best Paper Award: MadWeb - Measurements, Attacks, and Defenses for the Web, 2021

Best Paper Award: International Conference on Information Systems Security and Privacy, 2016

Roberto Padovani Scholarship Award, Qualcomm, Inc. ($5.000), 2011

Graduate Student Fellowship, Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Science ($90,000+), 2010

Fellowship for Excellent Students Abroad, Rudolf Chaudoire Foundation ($5,000), 2008

Scholarship for Short Time Academic Research and Expert Courses Abroad, TU Graz ($1,000), 2008

Fellowship for Excellent Students, Julius Raab Foundation ($5,000), 2003

Study Grant, Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research($50,000+), 2002-2009
Contact
contact (at) firstname lastname (dot) com