Darktrace funded studentships - 02

PhD Studentship in Cyber Security and AI: Deepfake Attribution and Generative Model Fingerprinting for Disinformation Source Tracking Loughborough University is inviting applications for a Doctoral Studentship in association with our collaborative partner, Darktrace, a global leader in cyber security AI, to start in July or October 2026. AI generated deepfakes have dual use, they are capable of doing good in good hands but are equally able to cause harm to businesses, governments, and society in general. We see the rise of mis/disinformation spread on social media, where deepfakes have increasingly started to play a central role in this. Generative AI for deepfake attribution and source tracking has the potential to offer mitigation strategies, where it will have a positive impact on helping law enforcement and platforms identify malicious actors and prevent future attacks. This PhD aims to design a system that not only detects deepfakes but also traces their origin and generative model fingerprint. As such, it examines answering the following research questions: 1) How can generative models be fingerprinted based on their output artifacts? 2) Can attribution techniques reliably identify the origin of deepfakes in real-world scenarios? 3) How can blockchain or distributed ledgers enhance media authenticity verification? The expected impact-driven research contributions from this PhD are a novel generative model fingerprinting framework for attribution; a secure provenance system for media authenticity; and guidelines for policy and platform integration to combat disinformation. 94% of Loughborough’s research impact is rated world-leading or internationally excellent. REF 2021

The standard University IELTS English language requirement is 6.5 overall with 6.0 in each individual element (reading, writing, listening and speaking).

October 2026

21 July 2026

• London, United Kingdom