Dear students,
In Week 10, we’ll have a special guest lecture by Dr. Hammond Pearce. Please note that this lecture will start at 3:00 pm on Wednesday, instead of our usual 2:00 pm start time.
Title: Bugs Begin, Bugs Begone: Large Language Models and Cybersecurity
Abstract
Software developers—both human and AI-assisted—can introduce cybersecurity vulnerabilities into their code. Emerging "smart" code agents, such as OpenAI's ChatGPT/Codex, GitHub Copilot, and Anthropic's Claude, can unintentionally contribute to these issues. However, AI-enabled tools also hold significant potential in detecting and mitigating security flaws.
In this research talk, Dr. Pearce will explore the effectiveness of AI-driven solutions for identifying and repairing vulnerabilities. He will discuss the role of prompt engineering in both exacerbating and mitigating security flaws in AI-generated code and examine how the robustness of large language models can be measured for this purpose. His findings demonstrate that while LLMs can aid in cybersecurity bug repair, much work remains to be done in optimizing their reliability.
About the speaker
Dr. Hammond Pearce is a Senior Lecturer at UNSW Sydney's School of Computer Science and Engineering. Prior to this, he served as a Research Assistant Professor at NYU's Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering / NYU Center for Cybersecurity and completed a research internship at NASA Ames. His research focuses on cybersecurity, hardware and embedded systems design, and the intersection of AI with industrial informatics—particularly in the evolution of design processes in hardware and firmware development.
Dr. Pearce is passionate about investigating how AI-driven tools, such as ChatGPT and other large language models, influence hardware and software development as well as social media. His research has earned several accolades, including the 2026 NSW Young Tall Poppy award, the Cybersecurity Award 2023 for the Best Machine Learning and Security Paper, the Efabless AI-Generated Open-Source Silicon Design Challenge, and the Distinguished Paper Award at the IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (2022). He has received funding from organizations such as Australia's ARC, CSIRO, Google, and Intel Corporation. Dr. Pearce obtained his Ph.D. in 2020 from the University of Auckland, New Zealand.
We hope you can join us.
Dear Students,
The deadline for the COMP9444 Project Submission is:
Monday, 23 November, 5:00 PM
Please carefully follow the guidelines below for your submission.
Each team must submit the following:
You may compress these files into a single ZIP file before submitting.
Please email your submission to your tutor. You can find your tutor's contact information here:
Tutorial Schedule
Please:
Due to potential file size limitations, please do not attach large files directly to the email. Instead:
This is a group project. The aim is for all team members to work together towards a common outcome. Your presentation and submission should reflect a collaborative effort rather than individual work.
Thanks,
COMP9444 Admin Team
Dear students,
As we approach Week 10, please note the following important points regarding your group project presentations:
Kind regards,
COMP9444 Admin Team
Kind regards,
COMP9444 Admin Team
Dear students,
A dataset guide for Project 12 is now available on WebCMS under the Project section. Please refer to it if you have chosen Project 12.
Kind regards,
COMP9444 Admin Team
Dear students,
The group project schedule is now available on WebCMS under the Project section.
Best regards,
COMP9444 Admin Team
Dear students,
The consultation session will now be held in Quadrangle 1042 from 4:00 to 5:30 pm.
The session will be conducted by Piotr.
Kind regards,
COMP9444 Admin Team
Dear Students,
Due to a facilities issue in Gold G07, today's COMP9444, T18C class has been relocated:
Date: Tuesday 6 October
Time: 6:00pm – 8:00pm (no change)
Correct location: SEB B27
This change applies to today's class only.
Thanks,
COMP9444 Admin Team
Dear Students,
Monday, 5 October, is a public holiday, so all tutorial sessions scheduled for Monday will be conducted online this week.
Please find your session details and join your tutorial using the relevant link below.
M11A
Tuesday, 6 October | 11:00 am–1:00 pm
Tutor: Dipankar Srirag
Email: d.srirag@unsw.edu.au
Link
M18A
Tuesday, 6 October | 11:00 am–1:00 pm
Tutor: Raktim Kumar Mondol
Email: r.mondol@unsw.edu.au
Link
Please make sure you join your tutorial at the scheduled time.
Thank you,
COMP9444 Admin Team
Dear Students,
The assignment, “Training and Weight Analysis for MNIST,” is now available on WebCMS.
The assignment is due on Wednesday, 21 October at 10:00 pm.
You can access the assignment through the WebCMS menu. Please read the assignment description carefully for full details, requirements, and submission instructions.
Thanks,
COMP9444 Admin Team
Dear students,
The Project Descriptions and Project Marking Criteria are now available on WebCMS under the Project section.
Please make sure to read the Project Marking Criteria carefully before choosing your project.
Please note that group formation will take place on Moodle, not WebCMS. You can now create your groups of 5 members.
All team members must be officially enrolled in the same tutorial session.
The deadline for group formation is 11 October at 5:00 pm.
Best regards,
COMP9444 Admin Team
All sessions will be conducted by Arhaan Gupta.
Kind regards,
COMP9444 Admin Team
Dear Students,
For the group project, form groups by the end of Week 4, and all group members need to be enrolled in the same tutorial. If you need to change your tutorial, please get in touch with the Student Nucleus Hub, as the teaching team cannot change tutorial enrolments.
Please send all course-related enquiries to cs9444@cse.unsw.edu.au. Please do not contact tutors or the course convenor directly, as they may not be able to respond to individual enquiries.
Thank you for your cooperation.
Kind regards,
COMP9444 Admin Team
Welcome to COMP9444 T3 Neural Networks and Deep Learning