I am a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) of Information Security in the Computer Science Department at University College London (UCL), and am part of the Information Security Research Group (sec.cs.ucl.ac.uk).

In addition to my computer science background, I have an interest in design, psychology, and sociology. I draw from these disciplines in my research which is centred around understanding and improving various online social interactions and computer and AI-mediated communication behaviours. In particular, I am interested in how social computing technologies can be designed to reduce online harms such as cyberbullying, child abuse, and misinformation spread. Whilst this is my primary area of research, I am also interested in research at the intersection of technology, crime and policing having previously spent over 10 years working within digital policing/forensics.

Office hours (2024/25)

Click here to book a meeting with me.

Current PhD Supervision

• Lisa Mekioussa Malki - Online privacy research (topic being developed)
• Kyle Beadle - Community-based surveillance and moderation
• Lauren Scott - Conducting social computing research into how family networks are affected by online misinformation, and how they could act as a resource to help reduce its impact.

I am currently accepting PhD student applications. Email me: mark(dot)warner(at)ucl(dot)ac(dot)uk

Current Research Fellows/Assistants

• Dr Catherine O’Brien (Research Fellow, Triage and UseCRT Projects)
• Dr Valeria Abreu Minero (Senior Research Fellow, Triage Project)

Past Research Fellows/Assistants

• Ms Liying Yang (completing here PhD at Northumbria University)
• Dr Husnain Rafiq (now Lecturer in Cyber Security at Edge Hill University)
• Dr Selina Sutton (OMDDAC)

I am currently accepting PhD students. Email me: mark(dot)warner(at)ucl(dot)ac(dot)uk

Current research projects

• Usability and User Experience of Content Report Tools (UseCRT): This project is investigating the usability and user experience of online content reporting tools design to support people to report incidents of harassment (REPHRAIN funded)
• Towards a Smart Digital Forensic Triage Tool to Support Police First Responders (TRIAGE) - ESRC funded project starting March 2024.
• Child Sexual Abuse Conversation Dataset (CSAC): The development of a child sexual abuse conversation dataset, this project will lead to advances in our understanding of how perpetrators of child sex grooming engage online with young people through computer-mediated communication tools and platforms. The dataset will, for the first time, provide researchers with access to real-world grooming conversations (offender side only), laying the foundations for work into reactive and proactive mechanisms for limiting this behaviour across platforms, and improving digital investigation workflows (REPHRAIN Funded).
• Effective warnings to prevent Authorised Push Payment (APP) frauds: This project is investigating the effectiveness of existing online banking warnings at preventing APP fraud payments, and developing and evaluating novel warning mechanisms.
• Usable Privacy in Female Health Apps: This project is exploring usable privacy mechanisms within female health apps (Google Faculty Award Funded).

Completed projects

• Observatory for Monitoring Data Driven Approach to COVID-19 (AHRC): OMDDAC researched data-driven approaches to Covid-19, focusing on legal, ethical, policy and operational/technical challenges. Ther project analysed key data-driven responses to Covid-19 and collated lessons learned throughout the pandemic by way of stakeholder interviews, case study analysis, representative public surveys and practitioner-focussed guidelines.

Publications Website

• Errors and Regrets in CMC (UCL CS): This project explored errors and regretful messages within messaging applications. In particular, it focused on understanding how users both use and perceive the use of the message “delete for all” functional introduced across most modern day instant messaging applications.

CSCW’21 Pub

• Privacy unravelling in online social environments (Marie Skłodowska-Curie PhD fellowship): drawing on theory from the fields of psychology, economics, sociology, and evolutionary biology, to understand people’s online social behaviours. This work was especially interested in how people manage privacy around sensitive information in online social spaces and in particular, the impact non-disclosures can have through the social effect of privacy unravelling.

CSCW’18 Pub CHI’19 Pub CHI’20 Pub

• Key2Kindness (REPHRAIN funded): This interdisciplinary project is investigating the role of proactive hate speech awareness mechanisms in reducing the production of hate speech across online social platforms (REPHRAIN Funded).

Pre-print Pre-print

Education

• PhD in Computer Science / Human-Computer Interaction, 2020
  University College London, UK
  Advisor: Professor Ann Blandford Thesis: [Signalling and Unravelling: (Non)Disclosure of HIV Status Information in Sex-Social Apps Used by Men Who Have Sex With Men]

  Thesis

• MSc in Security Management, 2016
  University of Portsmouth, UK

Work Experience

Prior to academia, I worked as an advisor in digital forensics for a criminal investigations department in the Middle East. I was responsible for developing enhanced capabilities for extracting, analysing, and processing data from electronic devices in criminal investigations. Prior to this, I was working for various law enforcement agencies within the UK, focused on developing advanced mobile forensics data recovery techniques.

Updates

• Oct-24: I presented initial findings from the Triage project to the The Chartered Society of Forensic Sciences
• Oct-24: I was awarded (and started) a REPHRAIN funded project exploring the usability and user experience of online content reporting tools.
• Sep-24: Dr Val Abreu presented an abstract at Eurocrime’24 on the Triage project.
• Mar-24: We kicked off the ESRC Triage project with an incredible launch event with some of our key stakeholders
• Jan-24: We had a CHI’24 paper accepted from our Google Project on Usable Privacy in Female Health Apps
• Sep-23: I was awarded an ESRC grant (£550,000) to explore policing needs around the seizure of digital evidence at crime scenes.
• Jun-23: I joined the CHI Understanding People (Qualitative) sub-committee as an Associate Chair (AC) for another year (CHI’2024).
• Jun-23: Started our REPHRAIN funded project to build a novel new conversation dataset.
• Jun-23: My PhD student, Lauren Scott has had a short paper accepted at INTERACT’23!
• Apr-23: Started a Google Funded project exploring privacy mechanisms within FemTech apps.
• Feb-23: I have been awarded a grant which I am very excited about (details to follow).
• Feb-23: My PhD student Lauren Scott has had a paper accepted at CHI 2023!
• Jan-23: I won a Google Faculty Award (2023) grant with Ruba-Abu Salma (KCL) on Usable Privacy in Female Health Apps.
• Sep-22: I joined the CHI Understanding People (Qualitative) sub-committee as an Associate Chair (AC) for 2023
• Sep-22: I started a new role as Lecturer in Information Security at University College London (UCL).
• Jul-22: New baby arrived (called Otis)!
• Sep-21: I have had a research project funded through REPHRAIN, this project aims to understand whether a keyboard could be designed to provide guidance and support to people as they type, and to notify them of any harmful content contained within the message in order to reduce the likelihood of them pressing send.
• Jan-21: I had a paper accepted to CHI’21 titled “Oops…”: Mobile Message Deletion in Conversation Error and Regret Remediation. This paper explored people’s use of the message delete function in mobile messaging apps like WhatsApp.
• Jan-21: I have accepted an invitiation to serve as a Review Editor for Frontiers in Digital Health Human Factors and Digital Health
• Jan-21: I joined the CSCW program committee as an Associate Chair (AC) for 2021
• Nov-20: A UKRI (AHRC) project that I am Co-I has been funded (~£400,000)
• May-20: I had a paper accepted at SOUPS 2020 with lead author Agnieszka Kitkowska
• Jan-20: I had a paper accepted at CHI’20 titled Evaluating ‘Prefer not to say’ Around Sensitive Disclosures which reports the findings from a constrolled online experiment looking to understand the impact of non-disclosures of sensitive information in online social environments
• Jan-20: I am serving as an AC for CHI’20 LBW track