Sean Rui Xiang Tan

Papers

Total Citations

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About

Sean Rui Xiang Tan is a leading researcher in cybersecurity and privacy, with a focus on novel side-channel attacks that exploit everyday smart devices. His major contributions center on exposing hidden vulnerabilities in consumer technologies, most notably through his pioneering work on acoustic eavesdropping. Tan’s landmark paper, “Spying with your robot vacuum cleaner” (83 citations), introduced LidarPhone—a groundbreaking attack that repurposes a robot vacuum’s lidar sensor to reconstruct private conversations from subtle vibrations on nearby objects. This work, alongside its companion paper “LidarPhone: acoustic eavesdropping using a lidar sensor” (11 citations), demonstrates how seemingly innocuous hardware can be weaponized for surveillance, challenging assumptions about IoT security. By revealing that lidar—a sensor designed for navigation—can serve as a covert microphone, Tan has reshaped the threat landscape for smart home devices. His research not only highlights critical privacy risks but also inspires new defenses against such side-channel exploits. With over 90 combined citations, Tan’s work is essential reading for students and researchers exploring the intersection of hardware security, privacy, and adversarial machine learning, cementing his reputation as a creative and impactful voice in the field.