Applications are sought for PhD research developing models and mechanisms to enforce security constraints within multi-tenant cloud computing platforms. This position will be based at the Department of Computer Science in the University of Otago (New Zealand's top-ranked university for research quality). The expected focus of the security research will be into distributed access control and decentralised information flow control. The PhD work is to be carried out under the supervision of David Eyers. Successful applicants will have keen interests in distributed systems, computer networks, cloud computing and security models. If you have questions about the research project, please contact David.

This research position is intended to complement a project funded by the United Kingdom Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), CloudSafetyNet, with which David is involved.

It is intended that innovative cloud security technologies developed within the project will be deployed and tested on the development facilities of the New Zealand National eScience Infrastructure (NeSI).

Otago's PhD scholarships are open to qualified students from any country, and cover both course fees and living expenses. To be considered for admission to the Computer Science department's PhD programme, applicants must have at least a four-year undergraduate degree in Computer Science [or in a related discipline]. Applicants must also have a research project worth at least 25% of a full-time load in their final year. To be considered for a PhD scholarship, applicants must have an 'A' average or better in their final year of study.

If you wish to apply for this PhD position, please email David Eyers, attaching an electronic copy of your transcript for your Bachelor's degree. If you have a Master's degree, or are currently enrolled in one, please attach your Master's transcript (up to the present) and, if possible, an abstract of your thesis. If you have publications, please select your best publications (no more than three) and send PDF versions of them, identifying the conference or journal that accepted it in sufficient detail to allow verification.

We are looking for candidates who are able to begin research in 2013, so have set a deadline of the 28th of February 2013 for this round of applications. However, since PhD and scholarship applications are reviewed monthly throughout the year, please get in contact if you are interested but cannot work to this deadline.

Placed online in January 2013.