Shuyuan’s research advances a forward-looking cybersecurity agenda that centers on trusted human-computer interaction as the next frontier of cyber defense. Her work addresses the most consequential human-centered threats in the digital ecosystem—cyber insider threats, computer-mediated deception and deepfakes—by rethinking how trust, intent, and manipulation are detected and defended against in increasingly intelligent and autonomous systems.
At the core of her research program is the theory of trustworthiness attribution, which integrates foundational insights from social psychology, attribution theory, and information systems to model insider threat detection supported by cyberinfrastructure. Building on this foundation, Shuyuan develops the dyadic attribution model, a novel approach for assessing human trustworthiness in sophisticated online interactions where intent is often concealed, mediated, or algorithmically amplified. This framework moves cybersecurity beyond static risk models toward dynamic, relational, and behavior-aware defense systems.
Methodologically, Shuyuan pioneers the use of interactive online games and simulated environments as experimental protocols for studying deception, betrayal, and trust breakdowns in virtual organizations. These environments enable controlled yet realistic observation of adversarial behavior, creating empirical foundations for next-generation cyber defense research. Her sociotechnical approach deliberately bridges theory and practice, combining social-psychological models with pragmatic theories of language-action to establish innovative methods for computational behavioral inference.
A defining contribution of this work is the concept of collective sensing, which positions generative AI and large language networks as mechanisms for integrating language-action cues to infer human disposition, intent, and risk within complex trust relationships. This line of research sets the stage for future cybersecurity systems that do not merely react to attacks, but anticipate, interpret, and adapt to human behavior in real time.
From theory, Shuyuan’s research extends into real-world experiments and applied domains, analyzing digital evidence and big data drawn from social media, network traffic, IoT devices, and multimedia sources to address organizational and societal cybersecurity challenges. To strengthen organizational cyber awareness, she applies activity theory to conceptualize cyber defense as a collective activity system—offering a transformative lens through which organizations can develop shared cyber defense consciousness, coordinated response, and resilient security cultures.
Her work also engages urgent societal concerns. To counter cyberbullying and the erosion of free expression in digital spaces, Shuyuan develops big-data profiling analytics based on charged language, proposing identification algorithms that enable early intervention and prevention of escalated or criminal online behavior. As cybercrime-as-a-service (CaaS) continues to normalize and scale cyber threats globally, her research underscores the growing importance of advanced cyber forensics for law enforcement, particularly in analyzing distributed, heterogeneous digital evidence across IoT ecosystems and network infrastructures.
Beyond institutional and societal defense, Shuyuan’s research agenda also extends to personal cyber resilience. During the pandemic, she developed the social distance nudge, a context-aware mHealth intervention designed to influence and safeguard individual behavior—demonstrating how cybersecurity principles can be translated into human-centered interventions that support everyday decision-making in times of crisis.
Collectively, Shuyuan’s work articulates a vision for the next generation of cybersecurity research—one that integrates human behavior, intelligent systems, and sociotechnical design to redefine how trust, deception, and defense are understood in a digitally mediated world. Her scholarship lays the groundwork for future cybersecurity systems that are not only technically robust, but socially aware, ethically grounded, and adaptive to the evolving human dimensions of cyber risk. Additional details about Shuyuan’s work can be found on her ORCID, Google Scholar and CV.
Education
- TrustedCI Fellow, The NSF Cybersecurity Center of Excellence (2021)
- Ph.D., Information Sci. & Tech., Syracuse University iSchool (2009)
- M.Phil., Information Transfer, Syracuse University iSchool (2007)
- M.B.A., Information Systems, University of Hartford (1996)
- B.S., Computer Science, Ohio Dominican University (1993)
Shuyuan is an active member of several leading international academic and professional associations, including the Association for Information Systems (AIS), the American Society for Information Science & Technology (ASIS&T), the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), the International Information Systems Security Certification Consortium, Inc. (ISC)², and the Information Systems Audit & Control Association (ISACA). Her engagement with these communities reflects a sustained commitment to interdisciplinary scholarship, professional service, and the advancement of cybersecurity research and practice.
Shuyuan also holds globally recognized professional certifications, including Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP), Certified in Risk and Information Systems Control (CRISC), and Certified Information Security Manager (CISM), underscoring her expertise at the intersection of technical security, risk management, and organizational leadership.
Research Interests
Trusted human-computer interactions; trustworthiness attribution; computer-mediated deception; collective intelligence; deepfakes; cyber forensics; cyberbullying; sociotechnical systems
Teaching Interests
Cybersecurity; information systems; information science; information ethics; cyber defense operations
Publications & Research
Shuyuan founded the iSensor Analytics Lab in 2010 as a forward-looking research environment dedicated to advancing sociotechnical cybersecurity research at the intersection of human behavior and intelligent systems. The lab focuses on human factors in cyberspace—particularly behavioral threats, trust, and deception—positioning human-centered risk as a first-class concern in the design of next-generation cyber defense.
Operating as both a live and virtual laboratory, iSensor Analytics enables controlled yet realistic experimentation grounded in real-world cyber trust and deception scenarios. Through carefully designed simulations, the lab captures rich behavioral, linguistic, and interactional data, creating empirical foundations for understanding how adversarial behavior emerges, evolves, and can be detected within complex digital environments. This experimental infrastructure supports pioneering research on computational behavioral inference and sociotechnical resilience.
A hallmark outcome of this research is Shuyuan’s patented invention, “Online Polygraph: Systems and Methods for Detecting Deception in Computer-Mediated Communication” (U.S. Patent No. 11,714,970; FSU Tech ID 21-020), issued on August 1, 2023. The patent establishes a novel paradigm for automated deception detection, setting the stage for scalable, human-aware cybersecurity systems.
In addition, Shuyuan has developed copyrighted innovations that translate research into societal impact. These include Veracity AI, a truth-disclosure system designed to counter adversarial image manipulation, and Pandemic Self Defense (FSU Tech ID 21-003), a context-aware mHealth intervention that enhances situational awareness and supports individual decision-making during public health crises. Together, these innovations reflect a broader vision of cybersecurity as both a technical and human safeguard—spanning organizational defense, societal trust, and personal resilience. For recent publications, inventions, and ongoing work, please refer to Shuyuan’s ORCID, Google Scholar, and CV.
Grants & Awards
- Florida State University Seed Award (047041): Multimodal Deepfake Information Manipulation, Analysis and Detection, $99,663, 06/21/24--05/06/26. Role: Principal Investigator.
- 2024-2025 Fulbright U.S. Scholar at Alma Mater Studiorum—Università di Bologna (Unibo) Facoltà di Informatica e Ingegneria, Bologna, Italy.
- U.S. Air Force STTR Phase II (AF21A-TCSO1 Phase II F2-15465, FA864922P0708): Project Aletheia: Detecting Adversarial Manipulation of Image Data, $750,000, 3/10/22-6/30/23. Role: Principal Investigator.
- Florida State University Collaborative Collision Seed Award (CC-046280): An Examination of the mHealth Mobile Phone App on COVID-19 knowledge and vaccine hesitancy among residents of a Federally Qualified Housing Community, $10,000, 9/1/21-3/1/22. Role: Co–Principal Investigator.
- U.S. Air Force STTR Phase I (AF21A-TCSO1-0185, FA864921P1396): Project Aletheia: A Gamified Truth Disclosure Platform, $50,000, 5/1/21-7/31/21. Role: Principal Investigator.
- Florida State University Collaborative Collision Seed Award (CC-045704): Achieving Economic Normality and Public Health via Deep Learning Modeling and Contact Tracing, $19,519.50, 5/11/20-8/18/20. Role: Co–Principal Investigator.
- Florida Center for Cybersecurity (FC2): Capture-the-Flag (CTF) Scenario-based Cybersecurity Exercises Development, $50,000, 07/01/18-12/31/19. Role: Principal Investigator.
- The Blavatnik Interdisciplinary Cyber Research Center (ICRC) at Tel Aviv University, A machine learning collaborative study of language-action cues in deceptive communication, $79,826 (equivalent to $NIS312,000), 01/01/16-12/15/16. Activity report. Role: Co-Principal Investigator.
- National Science Foundation, I-CORPS: Market Impact Identification of Dyadic Attribution Model for Disposition Assessment Using Online Games, 1505195, $50,000, 12/15/14-12/31/16. Role: Principal Investigator.
- Florida Center for Cybersecurity, FC2: A Sociotechnical Approach to Lawful Interception and Computational Assessment of Information Behavior to Protect against Insider Threat, $25,000, 03/01/15-10/31/16. Role: Principal Investigator.
- Florida State University (ITS-181006): Development and implementation of cybersecurity virtual lab, $21,035, 03/01/15-02/28/16. Role: Principal Investigator.
- National Science Foundation (SaTC-1347113/Ho and 1347120/Hancock), EAGER: Collaborative: Language-action causal graphs for trustworthiness attribution in computer-mediated communication, $199,998, 09/01/13-08/31/15. Role: Principal Investigator.
- Florida State University Planning Grant (PG) Award, $13,000, 12/01/13-11/30/14. Role: Principal Investigator.
- Florida State University First Year Assistant Professor (FYAP) Award, $20,000, 05/10/12-08/06/13. Role: Principal Investigator.
- Drexel University Research and Scholarship Incentive Grants (R-SIG), $5,000, 2010-2012. Role: Principal Investigator.
- (ISC)2 Scholarship, $25,000, 2004-2006. Role: Scholarship Awardee.
- R.O.C. Ministry of National Defense 3-Year Award on VPN, CA, Firewall & Policy Management Technology Transfer, $1M, 1999-2003, ($303,000, 1999-2000 1st year). Role: Technology Director.
Shuyuan brings over twenty years of professional industry experience in information systems security, with a career rooted in building practical, resilient security solutions. Her work has included securing e-commerce systems using public key infrastructure, virtual private networks, and network security technologies, as well as designing role-based access control systems, policy-driven integrated firewalls, and intrusion detection frameworks.
In applied settings, Shuyuan has led and contributed to several large-scale security initiatives. She designed an enterprise information security architecture (EISA), known as SIMPL/E (Secure Information Management Platform and Environment), for a government client, translating complex security requirements into a coherent and sustainable system design. She also collaborated with multidisciplinary teams to establish a Security Operations Center for a military organization and successfully completed a large-scale virtual private network technology transfer project for a military research center.
Across these efforts, Shuyuan’s industry experience reflects a hands-on, collaborative approach to cybersecurity—grounded in real-world problem solving and informed by a deep understanding of how security systems are designed, deployed, and operated in complex organizational environments.
Expertnet Profile