PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Liehuang Zhu

Also known as Zhu Liehuang, 祝烈煌, Lie-Huang Zhu

Liehuang Zhu is a computer scientist at Beijing Institute of Technology whose research covers privacy-preserving computation, blockchain and the security of AI systems. He studied for a PhD there from 2001 to 2004, spent 2008–2009 as a postdoctoral fellow at Purdue University's Information Security Research Center, and became a professor in 2013. Springer published his three books on Internet of Things security and blockchain between 2017 and 2020, and he received the 2018 Network and Information Security Outstanding Talent Award and the 2020 Beijing Science and Technology Progress Award, second prize. Among his AI papers are Heda in 2018, on privacy-preserving training of machine learning classifiers; FaceAdv in 2020, an attack on face recognition; and PCDiff in 2025, on ownership protection for diffusion models. Since 2020, he is a professor in the School of Cyberspace Security at Beijing Institute of Technology, where he is the secretary of the Party Committee.

Badges

Timeline

  1. 2001–2007

    Doctoral student and lecturer

    From 2001 to 2004, he is a PhD student in the School of Computer Science at Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT). He then lectures in the same school from 2004 to 2007.

  2. 2007–2013

    Associate professor and Purdue postdoc

    He becomes an associate professor in the School of Computer Science in July 2007 and holds the post until June 2013. From December 2008 to December 2009, he is a postdoctoral fellow at Purdue University's Information Security Research Center.

  3. 2013–2020

    Professor and vice dean

    In 2013, he becomes a professor in the School of Computer Science at BIT. By 2019, he is also vice dean of the School of Computer Science and Technology.

  4. 2014–2020

    Best papers and national honours

    He wins best paper awards at IEEE IPCCC in 2014, IEEE/ACM IWQoS in 2017 and IEEE TrustCom in 2018. The China Communications Society gives him its Network and Information Security Outstanding Talent Award in 2018, and in 2020 he is named among the National Leading Talents and takes second prize in the Beijing Science and Technology Progress Award, ranking first.

  5. 2017–2020

    Three Springer books

    Springer publishes his Secure and Privacy-Preserving Data Communication in Internet of Things in 2017. Blockchain Technology in Internet of Things, with Keke Gai and Meng Li, follows in 2019, and Blockchain: Empowering Secure Data Sharing, with Meng Shen and Ke Xu, in 2020.

  6. 2018–2025

    Privacy and security for AI models

    In 2018, he coauthors Heda, a scheme that combines homomorphic cryptosystems with differential privacy to train machine learning classifiers with privacy protection, and in 2020 FaceAdv, a physical-world attack that uses adversarial stickers to deceive face-recognition systems. Two 2023 papers follow: the survey Artificial Intelligence for Web 3.0 and EASTER, a vertical federated learning method for heterogeneous models. PCDiff, a 2025 paper he coauthors, proposes an access-control framework that protects ownership of text-to-image diffusion models by regulating generation quality.

  7. Since 2020

    Professor of cyberspace security

    In July 2020, he becomes a professor in BIT's School of Cyberspace Security, where he is a distinguished professor, doctoral supervisor and secretary of the Party Committee; his research interests include artificial intelligence security. In 2026, he is an international liaison chair of the Nanyang Blockchain Conference at Nanyang Technological University. He is also a standing council member of the Chinese Association for Artificial Intelligence.

Career

  1. Since 2004Beijing Institute of TechnologyLecturer, Associate Professor
  2. NowChinese Association for Artificial IntelligenceStanding Council Member
  3. 2008–2009Purdue UniversityPostdoctoral Fellow

Education

  1. 2004Beijing Institute of TechnologyPhD

From the biography.

  1. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology trained or employed 44 of the 187 AI major-prize winners, more than any other universityIncludes Liehuang Zhu. 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.
  2. More people shaping AI studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology than at any other institutionIncludes Beijing Institute of Technology. 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.
  3. The company share of AI researchers’ top papers was 31% in 2020–2024 and 8% in 1970–1974Includes Beijing Institute of Technology. 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.
  4. Google has the highest combined h-index among AI organizationsIncludes Purdue University. 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.

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 Liehuang Zhu yet. Send us a free-licensed photo.

  1. Liehuang Zhu - Beijing Institute of Technology pure.bit.edu.cn. Checked 21 October 2026.
  2. Blockchain Technology in Internet of Things - Liehuang / Gai Zhu - Librairie Eyrolles eyrolles.com. Checked 21 October 2026.
  3. 北京理工大学网络空间安全学院 cst.bit.edu.cn. Checked 21 October 2026.
  4. [1812.02292] When Homomorphic Cryptosystem Meets Differential Privacy: Training Machine Learning Classifier with Privacy Protection arxiv.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  5. [2011.13526] Robust Attacks on Deep Learning Face Recognition in the Physical World arxiv.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  6. [2309.09972] Artificial Intelligence for Web 3.0: A Comprehensive Survey arxiv.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  7. [2310.13367] EASTER: Embedding Aggregation-based Heterogeneous Models Training in Vertical Federated Learning arxiv.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  8. [2504.11774] PCDiff: Proactive Control for Ownership Protection in Diffusion Models with Watermark Compatibility arxiv.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  9. 2026 Nanyang Blockchain Conference | NTU Centre in Computational Technologies for Finance | NTU Singapore ntu.edu.sg. Checked 21 October 2026.