About me
Academic background
I graduated (B.Sc. and M.Sc.) in Economics and Management of Networks and Innovation from the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia (Italy). I then obtained a Ph.D. degree in Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, awarded from the University of Plymouth (UK)
thanks to a programme of study funded by the
U.S. Air Force Office of Scientific Research. My doctoral thesis focused on the design of autonomous controllers for fixed-wing drones engaged in security missions.
During my Ph.D. studies I was affiliated with the Centre for Robotics and Neural Systems, then directed by Prof. Angelo Cangelosi. I also had the opportunity to spend several months as visiting researcher within the Laboratory of Artificial Life and Autonomous Robotics (LARAL), at the National Research Council's Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies (ISTC-CNR)
- under the guidance of
Prof. Domenico Parisi
and
Prof. Stefano Nolfi
- and within the
Laboratory of Intelligent Systems (LIS)
- directed by
Prof. Dario Floreano
- at the
École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL).
A list of publications can be found here.
Professional career
As a consultant I have been supporting both public and private organisations, in Italy and abroad, dealing with security issues. Areas of intervention included investigating on various kinds of cyber incidents, performing forensics analysis (also within the context of legal cases), identifying and performing comparative evaluations of security technologies, producing comprehensive threat/vulnerability/risk assessments.
Between 2012 and 2018 I have been coordinating Zanasi & Partners' research activities, being involved in several international research projects on security, intelligence and defence, funded by the European Commission
and its agencies (notably including
ENISA - European Union Agency for Cybersecurity
and
EDA - European Defence Agency) under the umbrella, amongst others, of the FP7, CIPS, Horizon 2020
and
PADR
programmes.
Between 2018 and 2020 I have been covering the role of corporate Cyber Security Specialist within the
Coesia group, dealing with cyber security incidents handling and forensics investigations, cyber threat intelligence collection and analysis, vulnerability assessment and penetration testing on both IT and OT environments.
Since September 2020 I am with the Barilla group
as IT Security Plants Manager, responsible for the cyber security posture of the group's manufacturing plants.
Research projects
Certifications
● EC-Council Certified Incident Handler v2
● ISACA Cybersecurity Fundamentals Certificate (CSX)
● Recorded Future Certified User
● Qualys Certified Specialist
● VMWare Carbon Black Cloud Enterprise EDR Associate Analyst
● Zscaler Cloud Transformation Specialist (ZCTS)
● Proofpoint Targeted Attack Protection (TAP) for Administrators - Level 1
● Proofpoint Email Protection - Level 1
● Proofpoint Protection Server: Basics - Level 1
● Cybrary - Protection of Information Assets
● Cybrary - Incident Response & Advanced Forensics
● Cybrary - End User Mobile Device Security
● Cybrary - Mobile Device Security Fundamentals
● Google Digital Analytics Fundamentals