PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Cong Wang

Also known as C.L. Wang, 王聰

Cong Wang researches cloud data security and AI systems security. He earned B.E. and M.E. degrees at Wuhan University, completed a Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering at Illinois Institute of Technology, interned at Palo Alto Research Center in 2011 and joined City University of Hong Kong in 2012. He coauthored a privacy-preserving cloud-auditing system in 2013 and became an RGC Research Fellow in 2021. In a 2021/22 project, he worked with Chao Shen on secure machine-learning services; in 2023, he coauthored NetGuard, which uses GAN-generated fake samples against model-inversion attacks on commercial Web APIs. He received the BOCHK Science and Technology Innovation Prize in FinTech in 2024; as of October 2026, he is CityU’s Chair Professor and Head of Computer Science, researching LLM red-teaming, federated learning and robust reinforcement learning.

Badges

Timeline

  1. 2011–2012

    An assistant professor at CityU

    He earns B.E. and M.E. degrees from Wuhan University and a Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering from Illinois Institute of Technology. He interns at Palo Alto Research Center in summer 2011 and joins City University’s Department of Computer Science as an assistant professor in August 2012.

  2. 2013

    Privacy-preserving cloud audits

    In 2013, he coauthors “Privacy-preserving public auditing for secure cloud storage,” a system that lets a third-party auditor check outsourced data integrity while protecting user privacy. It also supports simultaneous, efficient audits for multiple users.

  3. 2021

    An RGC Research Fellowship

    In 2021, he is an RGC Research Fellow.

  4. 2021–2022

    A joint ML-as-a-Service project

    Under the NSFC/RGC Joint Research Scheme for 2021/22, he is the Hong Kong principal investigator with Chao Shen of Xi’an Jiaotong University on “Towards Secure and Privacy-enhanced Machine Learning as a Service.”

  5. 2022–2025

    Editor-in-chief of IEEE TDSC

    From late 2022 to January 2025, he serves as editor-in-chief of IEEE Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing.

  6. 2023

    NetGuard for commercial APIs

    In 2023, he coauthors NetGuard, a paper that targets model-inversion attacks on commercial Web APIs with GAN-generated fake samples.

  7. 2024

    A BOCHK FinTech prize

    In 2024, he receives the BOCHK Science and Technology Innovation Prize in the FinTech field.

  8. As of October 2026

    Chair Professor and department head

    As of October 2026, he is a Chair Professor and Head of the Department of Computer Science at City University of Hong Kong. His research includes red-teaming for LLMs, federated learning and robust reinforcement learning.

Career

  1. Since 2012City University of Hong KongAssistant Professor
  2. 2011Xerox PARCIntern

Education

  1. Wuhan UniversityB.E. and M.E.
  2. Illinois Institute of TechnologyPh.D.

From the biography.

  1. More people shaping AI studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology than at any other institutionIncludes City University of Hong Kong. We estimate where the people shaping AI studied and where their careers led. Massachusetts Institute of Technology leads with 467 former students, including 291 recorded doctorates.
  2. The company share of AI researchers’ top papers was 31% in 2020–2024 and 8% in 1970–1974Includes City University of Hong Kong. We estimate where the people shaping AI worked when their most-cited papers appeared: the company share was 31% in 2020–2024 and 8% in 1970–1974, and Google led all organizations in 2020–2024.
  3. Google has the highest combined h-index among AI organizationsIncludes City University of Hong Kong. We estimate that Google holds the highest combined h-index at 8,016, while universities account for 73% of the deduplicated total across AI organizations.
  4. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology trained or employed 44 of the 187 AI major-prize winners, more than any other universityIncludes City University of Hong Kong. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology trained or employed 44 of the 187 AI major-prize winners, more than any other university. We compare doctorate and 5+ year employment links, career timing and current workplaces for 187 major-prize and 1,111 best-paper winners.

Colleagues

People named in this biography, and people with dated positions at the same organization in the same years.

Sources and credits

Photo: We have no published photo of Cong Wang yet. Send us a free-licensed photo.

  1. Enabling Privacy-Preserving Image-Centric Social Discovery iit.edu. Checked 22 October 2026.
  2. Privacy-preserving public auditing for secure cloud storage research.cuhk.edu.hk. Checked 22 October 2026.
  3. Group Cong cyber.cs.cityu.edu.hk. Checked 22 October 2026.
  4. NSFC/RGC Joint Research Scheme 2021/22 Supported Applications - Layman Summaries of Projects Funded in 2021/22 Exercise ugc.edu.hk. Checked 22 October 2026.
  5. Cong WANG cs.cityu.edu.hk. Checked 22 October 2026.
  6. Group Cong cyber.cs.cityu.edu.hk. Checked 22 October 2026.
  7. Sustainability Performance | Sustainability | Bank of China (Hong Kong) Limited bochk.com. Checked 22 October 2026.
  8. Cong WANG - CityUHK Scholars scholars.cityu.edu.hk. Checked 22 October 2026.