Tim Fake

Tim Fake explores how epistemic uncertainty and causal reasoning might inform cybersecurity threat modeling, particularly in adversarial environments involving RF protocols and quantum systems.  He is a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Cybersecurity at the University at Albany, where he teaches courses in penetration testing, secure programming, and risk modeling and simulation. His research focuses on the intersection of RF security, embedded systems analysis, and adversarial machine learning, with particular emphasis on IoT device security and wireless protocol vulnerabilities.

With over a decade of industry experience, Tim has conducted extensive security assessments across multiple sectors and has specialized expertise in RF analysis using software-defined radio platforms including GNU Radio, USRP and HackRF. His work encompasses firmware reverse engineering, hardware-level security analysis and the development of attack methodologies for
embedded systems. 

Prior to his academic appointment, Tim served as a cybersecurity consultant with Optiv Security, where he co-led the IoT Testing Advancement Group. His earlier career included roles as a computer scientist at the National Center for Adaptive Neurotechnologies and as a senior software engineer at General Dynamics, working on high-assurance systems.

Currently, Tim contributes to the IEEE Quantum Cybersecurity Framework Working Group, helping to develop technical standards for securing quantum architectures. His emerging research investigates the philosophical foundations of causation and epistemic uncertainty as they apply to signal processing and quantum protocols in cybersecurity contexts. He is beginning to formulate a theoretical framework that examines causal and epistemic structures in signal and quantum systems, with potential applications to threat modeling under uncertainty.