Professor Josep Domingo-Ferrer, established at the Universitat Rovira i Virgili (Tarragona, Catalonia), UNESCO Chair in Data Privacy and Director of CYBERCAT-Center for Cybersecurity Research of Catalonia, is interested in receiving Expressions of Interest of potential candidates for the Marie Sklodowska – Curie Individual Fellowship (MSCA – IF) 2019 call.  Selected candidates will receive dedicated support from the CRISES research group to write a successful proposal.

Universitat Rovira i Virgili (URV) is a public university in Tarragona, Catalonia, with over 15,067 students, of which 2,185 at the postgraduate level. URV is listed among the world’s top 100 universities under 50 years of age, according to the Times Higher Education University Ranking 2018. In the area of Computer Science, URV ranks among the world’s top 150 universities (Shanghai ARWU Ranking 2015).

The CRISES research group (www.crises-deim.urv.cat) belongs to the Dept. of Computer Engineering and Mathematics. It conducts research in the field of information security and privacy, with a focus on data anonymization, big data privacy, privacy in the cloud, mobile environments, private information recovery and codes, and security and privacy in connected cars, with around 25 members including computer scientists, mathematicians, statisticians and telecom engineers. They have participated in 2 H2020 projects (1 as coordinator), 2 FP7 projects and 3 FP5 projects (1 as coordinator), and they have led several Spanish and Catalan projects (always as coordinators), including a CONSOLIDER project with 6 universities and over 100 researchers. The group is the strongest one in its field not only in Catalonia but also in Spain. They co-ordinate CYBERCAT (Center for Cybersecurity Research of Catalonia, www.cybercat.eu), a new joint venture involving 6 universities of Catalonia.

For the MSCA-IF call of 2019, we are looking for postdoc(s) with experience in some of the lines of activity of the group:

• Big data privacy
• Data anonymization
• Security and privacy in connected cars
• Privacy in the cloud
• Privacy in smart cities
• Privacy in the internet of things
• Privacy in social networks
• Privacy in collaborative environments
• Cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology

We are looking for talented and innovative young scientists, strongly committed to high quality frontier research and able to add new insights to the existing URV core expertise. Only candidates with an outstanding record of research achievements and publications in top-quality journals will be considered.

URV as Hosting Institution located at Scientific Campus of Universitat Rovira i Virgili (Tarragona, Catalonia), has use of all the technical and scientific facilities for carry out this project.

Eligibility criteria

At the deadline for the submission of the proposals (11/09/2019), researchers:

• Shall be in possession of a doctoral degree or 4 years of full-time equivalent experience;
• Must not have resided or carried out their main activities in Spain for more than 12 months in the 3 years immediately prior to the above-mentioned deadline.
• Must be fluent in English (both written and spoken).

Selection process

Researchers willing to apply should check that they fulfil the eligibility criteria and then send an expression of interest, consisting of:

• A Curriculum Vitae
• A summary presentation of their research proposal / A motivation letter

Expressions of interest must be submitted to uspir@urv.cat  (Title of the e-mail “ URV- MSCA - Prof. Josep Domingo-Ferrer ) with cc to josep.domingo@urv.cat.

Proposals will be pre-selected on the basis of internal evaluation. Candidates will be informed of the results of the pre-selection a week after the deadline.