talks
An archive of my invited keynotes, seminar presentations, and guest lectures. Here you can find summaries of my talks on software security, dependability, and trustworthy AI-driven systems, along with links to slide decks and conference sites.
Keynotes
Trusting the System, Not Just the Model: A Perspective on AI-Enabled Autonomous Systems
Keynote The discourse around trustworthy AI has largely focused on properties of individual models (fairness, robustness, and explainability) while overlooking a fundamental reality: AI does not operate in isolation. In this talk, I argue for a shift from model-centric to system-level trustworthiness, and discuss what this shift means in practice for the design and assessment of dependable autonomous systems. Drawing on a layered framework that spans data trustworthiness, infrastructure dependability, human-system interaction, and governance, I show how established empirical methods can be applied to assess and improve trust at the system level.
Benchmarking GenAI for Software Engineering: Challenges and Insights
Keynote GenAI is rapidly reshaping software engineering, advancing capabilities in code generation, translation, testing, and issue analysis. However, current evaluation practices remain fragmented, inconsistent, and often irreproducible, making it difficult to assess genuine progress. This talk explores the challenges of systematically and transparently benchmarking GenAI for software engineering. We present a unified framework that integrates key components (metrics, workloads, prompting strategies, and experimental procedures) to enable rigorous and comparable assessments across diverse tasks.
Navigating a PhD in Software Reliability: Lessons Learned and Paths Forward
Keynote Serving as the Doctoral Symposium Keynote speaker at ISSREW 2025, this talk shares essential lessons, methodologies, and career strategies for PhD candidates navigating the field of software reliability. Professor Vieira outlines critical pathways for successful research, emphasizing experimental design, collaborative networks, and addressing modern reliability challenges in AI-driven systems.
LLMs for Trustworthy Software Engineering: Insights and Challenges
Keynote Large Language Models (LLMs) are transforming software engineering, offering new possibilities for developing secure and trustworthy software. This keynote explores the integration of LLMs into software development workflows, particularly their role in code generation. Supported by empirical evidence, we discuss the capabilities of LLMs in vulnerability detection and mitigation, and delve into the importance of assessing the trustworthiness of code, including the role of LLMs in verifying code quality and adherence to best practices.
Advances on the Detection of Software Vulnerabilities
Keynote Vulnerability detection is crucial to securing modern complex software systems. This keynote reviews recent paradigm shifts and engineering advances in vulnerability detection, ranging from static and dynamic analysis to the combination of multiple security tooling alerts. Supported by empirical research, Vieira discusses how combining analysis techniques and leveraging machine learning can significantly reduce false-positive rates and help developers focus on critical fixes.
Perspectives on Dependability and Security Benchmarking: TO BEnchmark OR NOT TO BEnchmark
Keynote Benchmarking has successfully driven performance improvements in systems for decades, but applying it to dependability and security remains exceptionally challenging. This keynote critically examines the state of the art in security and dependability benchmarking. Vieira explores the essential prerequisites, grand challenges, metrics, and tools required to make security assessments repeatable, reproducible, and trustworthy across industry and academia.
Other Keynotes
- Assessing and Improving the Trustworthiness of Cloud Applications. GAUSS @ IEEE International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering, ISSRE 2019, Berlin, Germany, Oct. 2019.
- Trustworthiness Benchmarking of (Safety) Critical Systems. International Conference on Computer Safety, Reliability, and Security, SAFECOMP 2019, Turku, Finland, Sep. 2019.
- Benchmarking the Security of Software Systems OR TO BEnchmark or NOT TO Benchmark. International Conference on Dependable Systems, Services and Technologies, DESSERT 2018, Kyiv, Ukraine, May 2018.
- Defending against Web Application Vulnerabilities. ICT 2015, Lisbon, Portugal, Oct. 2015.
Tutorial Presentations
- N. Antunes, M. Vieira: From Software Security Assessment to Security Benchmark. IEEE International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering, ISSRE 2018, Memphis, TN, USA, Oct. 2018
- N. Antunes, M. Vieira: Techniques and Tools to Defend against Web Application's Software Vulnerabilities. IEEE/IFIP International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks, DSN 2015, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil, Jun. 2015
- M. Vieira, N. Antunes: Benchmarking the Dependability of Computer Systems. International Conference on Quantitative Evaluation of SysTems, QEST 2013, Buenos Aires, Argentina, Aug. 2013
- A. Araújo Neto, M. Vieira: Assessing DBMS Security. Latin-American Symposium on Dependable Computing, LADC 2011, São José dos Campos, Brazil, Apr. 2011
- J. Estrella, K. Castelo Branco, M. Vieira: Security in Web Services: State-of-the-art and Research Opportunities. IEEE SERVICES 2010, Miami, FL, USA, Jul. 2010
- M. Vieira: Assessing the Robustness and Security of Web Services: State-of-the-art and Research Opportunities. IEEE SERVICES 2009 - PART II, Bangalore, India, Sep. 2009
- M. Vieira: Using the AMBER Data Repository to Analyze, Share and Cross-exploit Dependability Data. International Conference on Dependability, DEPEND 2009, Atenas, Greece, Jun. 2009
- M. Vieira: Dependability Benchmarking of Computer Systems. EuroSys'09, Nuremberg, Germany, Apr. 2009
- M. Vieira, H. Madeira: Do you know... How to analyze and share results from dependability evaluation experiments? Latin-American Symposium on Dependable Computing, LADC 2007, Morelia, Mexico, Sep. 2007
Academic Seminars & Talks
- Identity, Ethics, and Cooperation in the Age of AI: The Adlerian Software Engineer and the Adlerian Classroom. 90th Meeting of the IFIP WG10.4, Charlotte, NC, US, Jun. 2026
- LLMs for Trustworthy Software Engineering: Insights and Challenges. UFAPE, PE, Brazil, Apr. 2026
- Field Data to Characterize Source Code and Detect Software Vulnerabilities. University of Cabo Verde, Cidade da Praia, Cabo Verde, Dec. 2022
- Benchmarking Machine Learning-based Online Failure Prediction Models. College of Computing and Informatics, University of North Carolina at Charlotte (UNC Charlotte), Charlotte, NC, USA, Feb. 2022
- Benchmarking the Security of Software Systems. Federal University of Pernambuco (UFPE), Recife, PE, Brazil, Feb. 2019
- Safety and Security of Autonomous Vehicles: Challenges & Research Directions. Federal Institute to Rio Grande do Norte (IFRN), Natal, RN, Brazil, Apr. 2019
- Fault Injection: Enabling Technique for Failure Prediction (and others). Federal University of Paraíba (UFPB), João Pessoa, PB, Brazil, Nov. 2018
- Failure Prediction: Enabling Technique for Improving Resilience. Federal University of Paraíba (UFPB), João Pessoa, PB, Brazil, Nov. 2018
- Benchmarking the Security of Software Systems. LASIGE Workshop'2018, University of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal, Jun. 2018
- Safety and security of intelligent vehicles: Challenges and research directions. C-Days, National Cybersecurity Centre, Coimbra, Portugal, Jun. 2018
- On the Metrics for Benchmarking Vulnerability Detection Tools. City, University London, London, UK, Apr. 2016
- Improving the Security of Web Applications and Services. State University of Campinas (UNICAMP), Campinas, SP, Brazil, May 2014
- Practical Evaluation of Intrusion Detection Tools for SQL Injection. State University of Campinas (UNICAMP), Campinas, SP, Brazil, May 2014
- Detecting Vulnerabilities in Web Services. KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium, Jun. 2014
- Design, Verification and Validation of large-scale, dynamic service systems. State University of Campinas (UNICAMP), Campinas, SP, Brazil, May 2014
- Robustness in Web Services: State-of-the-art and Research Opportunities. Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II, Naples, Italy, Jun. 2013
- Fault Injection & Robustness Testing: Enabling Techniques for Assessing Computer Systems. Università degli Studi di Firenze, Florence, Italy, May 2013
- Failure Prediction: The Future of Dependable Computing. State University of Campinas (UNICAMP), Limeira, SP, Brazil, Aug. 2012
- Failure Prediction: The Future of Dependable Computing. NOVA University of Lisbon, Almada, Portugal, May 2011
Industry Seminars & Talks
- Fault Injection: Enabling Technique for Assessing Computer Systems. Feedzai – Financial Crime Solutions, Coimbra, Portugal, Dec. 2016
- Failure Prediction: The Future of Dependable Computing. HP Labs Palo Alto, Palo Alto, CA, USA, Sep. 2011
- Failure Prediction: The Future of Dependable Computing. Oracle Corporation, Redwood Shores, CA, USA, Sep. 2011
- Failure Prediction: The Future of Dependable Computing. Dell EMC, San Mateo, CA, USA, Sep. 2011