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Department of Computer Science and Technology

Anh V. Vu

  • Research Scientist

Hi there! I am a Visiting Researcher at the Cambridge Cybercrime Centre, part of the Security Group. I am also a Research Scientist at TRM Labs — a leading blockchain intelligence platform, where I work on new methods to trace obscured money flows of illicit actors. I love observing the night sky, and I am part of the Cambridge Astronomical Society. My lovely home is Vietnam where the world's largest cave was discovered. I am proud of our cuisine — don’t miss it if you're visiting the country.

Biography

From January 2022 to January 2025, I was a PhD student at the University of Cambridge (Hughes Hall College), supervised by Professor Alice Hutchings and advised by Professor Ross Anderson within the Security Group. I was fully funded by the Department of Computer Science and Technology and the European Research Council. I completed my Master of Science in Information Science at Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology in 2018 under the supervision of Professor Mizuhito Ogawa and my Bachelor of Science in Information Technology at Vietnam National University in 2016, advised by Professor Xuan Hieu Phan.

From October 2019 to April 2025, I worked as a Research Assistant at the Cambridge Cybercrime Centre under Dr Richard Clayton, Professor Alice Hutchings, and Professor Ross Anderson. From June to July 2024 I visited Delft University of Technology to work with Professor Rolf van Wegberg on a research project co-funded by the Dutch Law Enforcement, focusing on the facilitators of financial cybercrime. From January to July 2019, I was a Research Intern at the National University of Singapore advised by Professor Min Suk Kang (now he is at KAIST). Before that, I was an Assistant Lecturer at Vietnam National University, from October 2016 to September 2017, and a Research Intern at FPT Technology Innovation, FPT Corporation, from December 2014 to December 2015.

Research

My research provides timely empirical measurements to explore cyberspace and its societal impact at scale, with a focus on the underground subcultures that foster online crime and harms. By integrating insights from both academia and industry, my work blends expertise in computer science and criminology to help better understand online threats and inform policy decisions for safety and security. I am also interested in cyberlaw and internet policy. I am fascinated by discovering new things with real impact. I am keen on collaborating with industry professionals, law enforcement, cybercrime offenders, and users of online communities. I believe good research should lead to practical implementations, facilitate other work, and teach us long-lasting lessons through decades instead of solely boosting citations.

I have been collecting and sharing large-scale datasets of online wickedness such as cyberattacks, illicit marketplaces, and online discussions on underground forums. These include over 300,000 defacement attack records spanning two decades, more than 200,000 contractual transactions on the Hack Forums marketplace, and around 65 million posts on extremist forums. All datasets are made available to academic researchers upon request, provided by the Cambridge Cybercrime Centre. Or just drop me a line!

Themes

Teaching

Guest Lectures

Supervisions at Cambridge

  • Algorithms: 
  • Software and Security Engineering
    • Easter 2022‑2023: 11 groups of 23 students for Clare (5), Emmanuel (2), Selwyn (3), Kings’ (9), and Fitzwilliam (4) College, 33 hours in total
    • Easter 2021‑2022: 6 groups of 14 students for Kings’ (8) and Robinson (6) College, 18 hours in total
  • Databases
    • Michaelmas 2022‑2023: 7 groups of 15 students for Clare (5), Emmanuel (2), Selwyn (3), and Downing (5) College, 21 hours in total
  • Object-Oriented Programming
    • Michaelmas 2022‑2023: 8 groups of 18 students for Gonville & Caius (5), Trinity Hall (4), and Kings’ (9) College, 32 hours in total
    • Michaelmas 2021‑2022: 5 groups of 10 students for Robinson (6) and Fitzwilliam (4) College, 20 hours in total

Final‑year Undergraduate Projects at Cambridge

Teaching at Vietnam National University

  • 2016-2017: Fundamental of Informatics (INT1003)
  • 2016-2017: Object-Oriented Programming (INT2204)

Professional Activities

  • Programme Committees
    • The International Conference on Financial Cryptography and Data Security (FC): 2025
    • The International Workshop on Cryptoasset Analytics (CAAW@FC): 2025
    • The ACM World Wide Web Conference (WWW): 2024
    • The ACM Internet Measurement Conference (IMC): 2022 (shadow)
  • Journal Reviewers
    • Journal of Cybersecurity: 2024
  • External Reviewers
    • The APWG Symposium on Electronic Crime Research (eCrime): 2024
    • The USENIX Security Symposium (SEC): 2024, 2023
    • The IEEE European Symposium on Security and Privacy Workshops (EuroS&PW): 2022

Research Talks

Podcasts

Publications

Peer-reviewed Conferences

Peer-reviewed Workshops

Book Chapters

Contact Details

Room: 
GC01
Office address: 
15 JJ Thomson Ave
Email: 

anh.vu@cst.cam.ac.uk

Department of Computer Science and Technology
University of Cambridge
William Gates Building
15 JJ Thomson Avenue
Cambridge
CB3 0FD

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