MATRIS Science Lab

IIASA Committee meets University of Salzburg

2026-10-06T00:00:00+02:00

After a closed morning session, the public afternoon programme at the Faculty of Digital and Analytical Sciences opened with welcomes by Dean Stefan Lang and Christian Koeberl, chair of the Austrian IIASA Committee (OeAW). Dimitris E. Simos then gave the keynote “Frontiers of Resilience”, followed by a discussion with the IIASA delegation and talks on research and career opportunities at IIASA, including its Young Scientists Summer Program.

University of Salzburg news

Salzburg Europe Summit 2026: how safe is Europe?

2026-09-28T00:00:00+02:00

The panel at Salzburg Congress discussed the security of Europe’s critical infrastructure. Ivan Yuryk (UKRENERGO) opened with “Ukraine: infrastructure as a lifeline”, followed by Michael Bamminger (Salzburg AG) and Michael Strugl (VERBUND). Dimitris E. Simos discussed with Cornelius Granig and Verena Jackson (Bundeswehr University Munich), moderated by Martina Salomon (Kurier).

Summit programme

Nomination for the Leadership Excellence Award in Research

2026-09-21T00:00:00+02:00

FH Salzburg nominated Dimitris E. Simos and Stefan Huber for the Leadership Excellence Award (LExA) in research, run by the LBG Career Center, in recognition of outstanding leadership.

FH Salzburg news (German)

AURELIA: hybrid threats to critical infrastructure

2026-09-01T00:00:00+02:00

AURELIA (Advancing Critical Infrastructure Resilience to Cyber Attacks and Natural Hazards) runs organisationally as two projects. At the University of Salzburg it started in May 2026 and runs until January 2027. At FH Salzburg it runs from September 2026 to August 2027, funded through the Trampoline IT 2026/27 programme. At the University of Salzburg, AURELIA combines discrete-mathematical modelling and combinatorial security testing with geospatial analytics and remote sensing. At FH Salzburg (PI Dimitris E. Simos, Co-PI Stefan Huber), it studies how timed cyber attacks and natural hazards interact in power grids and smart grids.

Chat Control: why client-side scanning endangers security

2026-08-25T00:00:00+02:00

Child protection is essential, Simos argues, but it must not come at the expense of fundamental rights. Analysing messages on the device before end-to-end encryption would put privacy, IT security and the confidentiality of digital communication at risk. He calls for transparency and an open dialogue with science, and notes that targeted investigations under judicial order are already available.

Dynamics of Disasters — Hybrid Threats Workshop held in Salzburg

2026-07-16T00:00:00+02:00

The workshop took place on 7 July 2026. Dimitris E. Simos was General Chair, Bernhard Garn and Klaus Kieseberg were Programme Co-Chairs, and Martina Marx and Tetiana Mazanko organised it. Panos Pardalos gave the plenary talk “A New Frontier: From a Single Network to a Network of Networks”. Further talks covered hybrid threats, vehicle security, and geospatial resilience, with interactive games run by Garn, Kieseberg and Dominik Schreiber. The Dynamics of Disasters series was founded in Athens in 2006. Springer post-proceedings with extended papers are planned.

University of Salzburg news

Cybersecurity research and transfer centre launched

2026-06-25T00:00:00+02:00

The centre evaluates security and privacy technologies on the basis of data and operates a cyber range. It is funded by the EU (ERDF) and the State of Salzburg, and is reported in the FH Salzburg magazine warum! (issue 02/2026).

IWCT 2026 in Daejeon

2026-05-18T00:00:00+02:00

IWCT is the main international venue of the combinatorial testing community. The 2026 edition took place on 18–22 May 2026 in Daejeon, South Korea, co-located with the IEEE International Conference on Software Testing, Verification and Validation (ICST 2026).

IWCT 2026 website

New Springer volume: Dynamics of Disasters — Hybrid Threats

2026-04-03T00:00:00+02:00

Dynamics of Disasters: Hybrid Threats (Springer Optimization and Its Applications, vol. 229), edited by Dimitris E. Simos, Panos M. Pardalos, Ilias S. Kotsireas, Bernhard Garn and Stefan W. Pickl, collects eleven chapters based on the DOD 2024 workshop. It includes the group’s chapter on constraint-based approaches for disaster scenario generation.

Springer

Public lecture in Vienna: “Underestimating Resilience in a Hybrid World”

2026-03-17T00:00:00+01:00

Natural and digital systems are now so tightly coupled that a flood can lead to a data breach and a cyber attack can make a natural disaster worse. In this public lecture, co-hosted by IIASA and the Austrian Academy of Sciences (OeAW), Dimitris E. Simos used examples such as blackouts and disruptions to communication, satellite and aviation networks to show how one point of failure spreads across sectors. He also showed how mathematical methods can reveal these hidden interdependencies.