Speakers
Jump to: Prof. Rajiv Ranjan · Prof. Mark Gillan · Dr Aftab Ali · Dr Muhammad Usman Hadi · Dr Aditya Japa · Dr Muhammad Aaqib · Mr Yasir Iqbal · Dr. Ben Harrison · Mr Shadi Razak · Mr Barry McSorley
Prof. Rajiv Ranjan
🎤 Keynote Speaker
University Chair Professor, IoT, School of Computing, Newcastle University
Professor Rajiv Ranjan is an Australian-British computer scientist, of Indian origin, known for his research in Distributed Systems (Cloud Computing, Big Data, and the Internet of Things). He is University Chair Professor for the Internet of Things research in the School of Computing of Newcastle University, United Kingdom. He is also Director of the Centre of AI Safety at Newcastle University. He is an internationally established scientist in the area of Distributed Systems (having published about 350 scientific papers). He is a fellow of IEEE (2024), Academia Europaea (2022) and the Asia-Pacific Artificial Intelligence Association (2023). He is also the Founding Director of the International Centre (UK-Australia) on the EV Security and National Edge Artificial Intelligence Hub, both funded by EPSRC. He has secured more than $68 Million AUD (£34 Million+ GBP) in the form of competitive research grants from both public and private agencies. He is an innovator with strong and sustained academic and industrial impact and a globally recognized R&D leader with a proven track record. He serves on the editorial boards of top quality international journals including IEEE Transactions on Computers (2014-2016), IEEE Transactions on Cloud Computing, ACM Transactions on the Internet of Things, The Computer (Oxford University), and The Computing (Springer) and Future Generation Computer Systems. He led the Blue Skies section (department, 2014-2019) of IEEE Cloud Computing, where his principal role was to identify and write about the most important, cutting-edge research issues at the intersection of multiple, inter-dependent research disciplines within distributed systems research area including Internet of Things, Big Data Analytics, Cloud Computing, and Edge Computing. He is one of the highly cited authors in computer science and software engineering worldwide (h-index=88+, g-index=330+, and 37500+ google scholar citations, h-index=67+ and 20500+ Scopus citations, and h-index=52+ and 12700+ Web of Science citations).
Dr Aftab Ali
Lecturer, School of Computing, Ulster University, Belfast
Dr. Aftab Ali is a Lecturer in the School of Computing at Ulster University in Belfast, United Kingdom. With over a decade of experience in academia, he has held lecturer and researcher positions at various universities. His research interests span across several areas, including cybersecurity, trust management in the Internet of Things (IoT), blockchains, digital twins, body area networks, Artificial intelligence, and machine learning applications. Dr. Ali has made significant contributions to his field through publications in scholarly international journals and conferences. Additionally, his work has led to the filing of several patents that focus on enhancing software productivity and cybersecurity using AI. Currently, Dr. Ali serves as the lead researcher on two projects, namely Software Risk Radar and Future IoT Security, at BT Ireland Innovation Centre (BTIIC). He leads a team of graduate students, supervising both MSc and PhD candidates, who work under his guidance and support. Dr. Ali’s expertise is also sought after in the publishing domain, where he serves as a reviewer and guest editor for several international journals. Overall, Dr. Ali has contributed in the capacity of serving on the technical program committee and registration chair for a number of different conferences and workshops. In addition to that, he has been an invited speaker at a number of conferences and workshops.
Dr Muhammad Usman Hadi
Assistant Professor, School of Engineering, Ulster University, Belfast
Dr Usman Hadi is a Lecturer in Engineering at Ulster University and CEO of Drone Sentinel Inc., specialising in 5G/6G communications, AI and cybersecurity for autonomous systems. He holds a PhD in Electronic Engineering from the University of Bologna, Italy, and previously held research positions at Aalborg University, Denmark and Nokia Bell Labs. With over 5000 citations, he has authored over 100 research publications. As Principal Investigator, he has received funding from EPSRC, Innovate U.K, Digital Twin Network Plus, DARe Hub, British Council, Garfield Weston Trust, Belfast City Council Advanced Connectivity Technologies Grant, and International Science Partnership Funds. He has been included in the top 2% of researchers for five consecutive years, since 2021. Dr Hadi is also a recipient of the Pitch of the Year Award from CYBERASAP Year 10 cohort. His research interests include cybersecurity for VANETs, machine learning for engineering applications, autonomous aerial vehicles, fiber wireless communications, microwave photonics, and devices for telecommunications.
Dr Aditya Japa
Lecturer, Ulster University, School of Computing, Engineering and Intelligent System, Derry/Londonderry
Aditya Japa received Ph.D. degree in Electronics and Communication Engineering, from Dr. SPM IIIT Naya Raipur, Chhattisgarh, India in 2021, with a focus on Emerging Technologies for Hardware security. After his Ph.D., he worked as Research Fellow with Centre for Secure Information Technologies (CSIT), Queen’s University Belfast, U.K. He is currently working as a Lecturer with School of Computing, Engineering and Intelligent Systems, Ulster University, Derry, UK. His research mainly focuses on Hardware and System Security. Specifically, he is into the design of PUF and TRNG design. He worked on emerging/beyond CMOS based security strategies, power side-channel analysis, and countermeasures. His current research interests include the design of PUFs Security in/for approximate computing and Security of Neural Network Accelerators.
Dr Muhammad Aaqib
Research Associate, BT Ireland Innovation Centre (BTIIC), Ulster University, Belfast
Muhammad Aaqib is a Research Associate at the BT Ireland Innovation Centre (BTIIC), Ulster University, working on the “Next Generation Threat Detection and Response” project. He develops data-driven cybersecurity solutions using correlation models and graph analytics to identify and prioritise emerging threats in IoT and edge-based systems. He holds a PhD in Computer Science from Ulster University, where his research explored trust management in edge-based IoT networks, and a Master’s and Bachelor’s in Mechatronics Engineering from UET Peshawar. His work has been recognised with a Best Paper Award at IEEE Smart World Congress. He is an Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (AFHEA).
Mr Yasir Iqbal
PhD Research, School of Computing, Ulster University, Belfast & Senior Engineer, AMIC, Queen’s University, Belfast
Yasir Iqbal is a final-year PhD researcher at Ulster University and a Senior Engineer – Digitalisation at AMIC, Queen’s University Belfast. His research focuses on trustworthy computation offloading in IoT, cyber-resilient IoT-Digital Twin systems across edge-cloud environments, and adaptive trust evaluation. His PhD investigates how trust-aware mechanisms can improve the security and resilience of resource-constrained IoT systems operating across edge and cloud-based Digital Twin environments. His recent work has been published in Elsevier’s Internet of Things and IEEE Transactions on Consumer Electronics, with further work accepted at the 2026 IEEE International Conference on Digital Twin. He holds a Master’s degree in Information Security from NUST, Islamabad, Pakistan. He also holds the CompTIA SecurityX certification and has professional experience across Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, spanning telecommunications, cybersecurity, networking, and digital technologies.
Prof. Mark Gillan
Chief Strategy Officer of Halō, Belfast
Prof Mark Gillan is Chief Strategy Officer of Halō. Halō is an AI digital twin company, HQ’d in Belfast, that initially developed its core architecture across speciality insurance, equine, aviation and marine sectors. Mark’s role is to help lead Halō’s expansion across aerospace, critical national infrastructure, utilities, transport, defence and government sectors, specialising in risk management and performance optimisation of complex systems.
Mark has over 3 decades of experience in leadership roles in Formula 1, aerospace, government innovation, academia and advanced technology. He led Jaguar /RedBull and Williams F1 race engineering teams, later served as CTO on Innovate UK, COO of Artemis Technologies and Head of R&D at NATS. More recently Mark was Associate Vice President of the National Transformation Institute at KAUST, in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, overseeing a diverse technology portfolio of more than $1 billion.
Mark has a PhD and BEng in Aerospace Engineering from Queen’s, is a Chartered Engineer, Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society, Coachmaker, and Visiting Professor at the Universities of Surrey, Ulster and Queen’s. In June 2026 he received an honorary DSc from Queen’s.
Dr Ben Harrison
Founder / CEO - Loquerion Security , Belfast
Ben is a passionate and experienced Cyber Security Technology evangelist, with 30 years’ in the IT, Security, and Engineering industries… After spending 3 decades seeing all the ways people get hacked, he’s driven to support others on their Security Journey at every oppertunity.”
His career has taken him through academia, with a PhD. from Queen’s University Belfast in advanced networks; on to working in the defense industry with a focus on wireless sensor networks for security applications; and then into the secure Set-Top box industry, working for the global leaders Arris Global Ltd. and Pace PLC, running SoC & Security Teams to deliver the very best in secure media platforms.
He joined the SAAS (Security As A Service) / MSSP (Managed Security Service Provider) industry with Alert Logic, leading the Security Content efforts to build Threat Intelligence functions for their SOC, and Active Intelligence departments. He moved on to then establish Cygilant in Belfast, building and leading the region’s first MSSP 24/7 operation, including Global Security Operations Centre and Security Services, with a key focus on evolving and delivering a scalable Modern SOC Roadmap. After successful acquisition by SilverSky, he continued to lead a globally expanding team across multiple regions, continuing to build scalable, robust, and effective Security Operations capabilities, delivering demonstrable customer security value through MDR, EDR, XDR, SOAR, and Security Services; with a special focus on development and integration of next generation AI / ML tooling.
Ben is very passionate about supporting and growing the Cyber Security and other technical communities in Northern Ireland. He speaks regularly at local, regional, and international events, and is a Director of the NI Cyber Cluster. He also supports local security events like BSides Belfast, and spends time in STEM outreach with local schools and colleges.
He most recently founded Loquerion Security, a start-up Cyber Security Tech company focused on novel and unique cyber security protection products, using AI & Machine Learning techniques to protect Personal Data against attack and abuse.
Mr Shadi Razak
CTO, ANGOKA, Belfast/London
Shadi A. Razak is a cybersecurity, physical AI, and business automation expert with a strong foundation in business, technology, and product strategy. His expertise in machine identity and access control, secure communication, cyber-physical and OT systems cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, and robotics business has made him a sought-after advisor and coach for a number of international blue-chip companies, government organisations, financial services and SMEs across the UK, Europe and the MENA region for the past 18 years.
He has been a visiting lecturer at several international and British universities, a steering committee member of a few UK and international think tanks and trade associations, like techUK, ADS, the Information Security Group (ISG) Alumni, Technology and Finance Society, and a mentor for several FinTech and SecurityTech start-ups in the UK and Europe.
Shadi lives and works in London (UK). He holds a BSc in Computer Engineering, a MSc in Information Security from Royal Holloway, University of London and an MBA from the University of Sunderland.
Mr Barry McSorley
Director of Engineer, ANGOKA, Belfast
Barry McSorley is a seasoned engineering executive with over 20 years of experience driving technology innovation and large-scale delivery in the telecommunications and deep-tech sectors. As Director of Engineering at ANGOKA, he oversees the company’s multi-disciplinary technical capabilities, spanning embedded software, hardware, and cloud infrastructure. Barry is responsible for aligning ANGOKA’s engineering strategy with its commercial ambitions, leading agile teams to develop cybersecure communication platforms and transitioning complex R&D initiatives into scalable, market-ready solutions for the aviation and smart mobility sectors as well as Cyber-Physical and Industrial Systems.
Prior to joining ANGOKA, Barry spent over two decades at companies like Cable & Wireless and Vodafone Group, where he served as Head of Platforms and managed extensive engineering operations across UK and Europe. A strong advocate for modern, scalable engineering practices, he is dedicated to implementing agile squad models, DevSecOps, and AI-assisted workflows to accelerate software delivery. Known for his pragmatic and collaborative leadership style,
Barry has a proven track record of mentoring technical teams and driving operational excellence through transformational change. A native of Northern Ireland Barry lives and works in Belfast, and holds a Masters degree in Advanced Electronics and BSc in Electronic Engineering from Queen’s University of Belfast.