Wolfpack Security and Privacy Research Lab
Welcome to the Wolfpack Security and Privacy Research (WSPR) Laboratory in the department of Computer Science at North Carolina State University.
The WSPR Laboratory (pronounced “whisper”) models, designs, builds, and validates technology that protects users, systems, and networks from malicious and privacy-infringing acts. The group’s six faculty members and affiliated students work on all areas of cybersecurity, from designing new cryptographic constructs to ensure protected execution of code to empirical studies on how software is secured by developers; from finding flaws in existing operating systems to building systems resilient from known attacks; from detecting malicious activity such as malware and denial of service attacks to building networks and mechanisms to prevent abuse. The WSPR Lab works to secure all types of computer systems, from legacy telephone networks to emerging technologies like smartphones and Internet of Things devices.
How to Get Involved
If you are a student at NCSU and are interested in …
- cybersecurity research, look at the research page and the web pages of the WSPR Faculty and feel free to contact them directly.
- cybersecurity skills, get involved with the NCSU HackPack club run by Dr. Kapravelos. Join the discord server for more information.
If you are an industry organization seeking to collaborate, look at the research page and the web pages of the WSPR Faculty and feel free to contact them directly. You may also email our general contact alias, [email protected].
Recent News
September 14, 2026: Our paper, Parsers of Babel: A Large Scale Study of URL Parsing Differentials, has been accepted for publication at the 2027 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (S&P)
September 4, 2026: Congratulations to WSPR faculty member Laurie Williams on her induction into the inaugural class of the ACM SIGSOFT Software Engineering Academy, which honors individuals whose cumulative work has shaped modern software engineering research, practice, and education.
September 4, 2026: WSPR faculty members Laurie Williams and William Enck helped lead the NSF Cybersecurity PI Conference. Laurie co-led a breakout session on faculty success and mentoring, while William served as a panelist discussing the impacts of artificial intelligence on the security research community.
April 8, 2026: Five NC State graduate programs earned impressive marks in the latest U.S. News & World Report rankings. The graduate computer science program climbed five spots to No. 46, while the College of Engineering ranked No. 28 and continued its streak among the nation’s top 30 graduate engineering programs.
March 18, 2026: Our paper, ASN1spect: Uncovering ASN.1 Compiler-Generated Vulnerabilities in Critical Infrastructure, has been accepted for publication at the 2026 ACM Secure Development Conference (SecDev).