[CS] Madison Pickering Candidacy Exam/Jan 23, 2026

[via cs]

This is an announcement of Madison Pickering's Candidacy Exam.
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Candidate: Madison Pickering

Date: Friday, January 23, 2026

Time:  2:30 pm CST

Location: JCL 298

Title:  LLMs as Context-Aware Interfaces for Supporting End-User Security and Privacy Needs

Abstract: Many security and privacy problems are impossible to divorce from the context in which they arise. For example, a user is more likely to make the password ``oliviarodrigo1!'' in 2025 than 2012, and more likely to choose that password for their Ticketmaster account than their bank. Attackers often use context of this type to inform their attacks. As attackers leverage context, so too should defenders. However, leveraging context often requires significant manual effort. We posit that LLMs may provide an automated route forward, enabling context-rich defense at scale. Specifically, this thesis argues that LLMs can act as context-aware interfaces for supporting end-user security and privacy needs. We explore this through application of an LLM to privacy policy annotation using the normative GKC-CI framework, as well as through password strength modeling with LLMs. We conclude by proposing two additional applications of LLMs for context-rich security and privacy tasks: one on modeling password strength in a global context and the other on personalized sensitive file detection.

Advisors: Blase Ur

Committee Members: Blase Ur, Grant Ho, Ari Holtzman, and Chris Kanich