Hi, this is Zhipeng
I am currently a Lecturer (equivalent to Assistant Professor) in Cyber Security in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Manchester (2025.08 – present). Previously, I was a Postdoctoral Research Associate (2024 – 2025) in the Department of Computing at Imperial College London, where I also completed my PhD in Computer Science (2020.10 – 2024.04). Before that, I obtained both my Master’s degree (2020) and Bachelor’s degree (2017) from Beihang University.
My research interests lie in the domain of privacy and security within decentralized and distributed computing systems, with a particular focus on blockchain and decentralized AI systems, as well as the underlying cryptographic primitives and protocols that support and secure them.
Currently, I am exploring the following topics:
- 🔗 Blockchain: privacy, security, consensus, and applications
- 🛡️ Applied cryptography: classical and post-quantum solutions
- 🌐 Decentralized AI: security, privacy, and incentive mechanisms
If you're interested in one or more of the research topics mentioned above, please feel free to get in touch with your CV and a brief motivation letter outlining your interests and background.
As a researcher, publishing papers is important, but what matters most is figuring out what you truly want to pursue, and doing your best to enjoy the journey.
I always welcome collaborations and discussions about research opportunities.
You can reach me at zhipeng[dot]wang0x01[at]gmail[dot]com or zhipeng[dot]wang[at]manchester[dot]ac[dot]uk[dot].
📚 Selected Publications
Full publication list can be found at Google Scholar.
🔗 Blockchain
[Preprint] Talking Transactions: Decentralized Communication through Ethereum Input Data Messages (IDMs).
Xihan Xiong, Zhipeng Wang, Qin Wang, Endong Liu, Pascal Berrang, William Knottenbelt.
Preprint.[Preprint] BRC20 Pinning Attack.
Minfeng Qi, Qin Wang, Zhipeng Wang, Lin Zhong, Zhixiong Gao, Tianqing Zhu, Shiping Chen, William Knottenbelt.
Preprint.[CSUR 2025] SoK: Bitcoin Layer Two (L2).
Minfeng Qi, Qin Wang, Zhipeng Wang, Manvir Schneider, Tianqing Zhu, Shiping Chen, William Knottenbelt, Thomas Hardjono.
Accepted at ACM Computing Surveys.[USENIX Security 2025] TockOwl: Asynchronous Consensus with Fault and Network Adaptability.
Minghang Li, Qianhong Wu, Zhipeng Wang, Bo Qin, Bohang Wei, Hang Ruan, Shihong Xiong, Zhenyang Ding.
Accepted at The 34th USENIX Security Symposium.[FC 2024] A Transaction-Level Model for Blockchain Privacy.
François-Xavier Wicht, Zhipeng Wang, Duc V. Le, Christian Cachin.
Financial Cryptography and Data Security 2024.
[WWW 2023] On How Zero-Knowledge Proof Blockchain Mixers Improve, and Worsen User Privacy.
Zhipeng Wang, Stefanos Chaliasos, Kaihua Qin, Liyi Zhou, Lifeng Gao, Pascal Berrang, Ben Livshits, Arthur Gervais.
The 2023 ACM Web Conference 2023.[AFT 2023] Pay Less for Your Privacy: Towards Cost-Effective On-Chain Mixers.
Zhipeng Wang, Marko Cirkovic, Duc V. Le, William Knottenbelt, Christian Cachin.
The International Conference on Advances in Financial Technologies 2023.[S&P 2023] SoK: Decentralized Finance (DeFi) Attacks.
Liyi Zhou, Xihan Xiong, Jens Ernstberger, Stefanos Chaliasos, Zhipeng Wang, Ye Wang, Kaihua Qin, Roger Wattenhofer, Dawn Song, Arthur Gervais.
The 44th IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy.[FC 2022] Speculative Multipliers on DeFi: Quantifying On-Chain Leverage Risks.
Zhipeng Wang, Kaihua Qin, Duc Vu Minh, and Arthur Gervais.
Financial Cryptography and Data Security 2022.
🛡️ Cryptography
[CT-RSA 2025] DSKE: Digital Signatures with Key Extraction.
Zhipeng Wang, Orestis Alpos, Alireza Kavousi, Harry W. H. Wong, Sze Yiu Chau, Duc V. Le, Christian Cachin.
Accepted at The Cryptographers’ Track at RSA Conference 2025.[Euro S&P 2024] SoK: Public Randomness.
Alireza Kavousi, Zhipeng Wang, Philipp Jovanovic.
IEEE European Symposium on Security and Privacy 2024.[ProvSec 2019] A Practical Lattice-Based Sequential Aggregate Signature.
Zhipeng Wang, Qianhong Wu.
International Conference on Provable Security 2019.
🌐 Decentralized AI
[WWW 2025 (Short Paper)] AIArena: A Blockchain-Based Decentralized AI Training Platform.
Zhipeng Wang, Rui Sun, Elizabeth Lui, Tuo Zhou, Yizhe Wen, Jiahao Sun.
Accepted at The Companion Proceedings of the ACM on Web Conference 2025.[TAI 2024] Defending Against Poisoning Attacks in Federated Learning with Blockchain.
Nanqing Dong*, Zhipeng Wang*, Jiahao Sun, Michael Kampffmeyer, William Knottenbelt, Eric Xing.
IEEE Transactions on Artificial Intelligence 2024.
* denotes equal contribution.
- [Preprint] SoK: Decentralized AI (DeAI).
Zhipeng Wang, Rui Sun, Elizabeth Lui, Vatsal Shah, Xihan Xiong, Jiahao Sun, Davide Crapis, William Knottenbelt.
Preprint.
🏆 Selected Awards and Grants
- Best Application Award @IEEE GBC 2025
- Best Student Paper Award Candidate @IEEE ICBC 2025
- Best Paper Award Candidate @IEEE ICBC 2024
- Ethereum Foundation Academic Grant 2024: Building Practical and Secure Blockchain-Based AI
🏛 Selected Talks
Migration to Post-Quantum Secure Blockchains @RITICS Showcase 2025. London, UK, 01/2025
How Can Blockchain Make AI More Decentralized? @UCL Distributed Ledger Technologies Seminar. London, UK, 11/2024
Pay Less for Your Privacy: Towards Cost-Effective On-Chain Mixers @AFT 2023. Princeton, USA, 10/2023
Blockchain Transaction Censorship: (In)secure and (In)efficient? @MARBLE 2023. London, UK, 07/2023
On the Usage, Privacy, and Censorship of On-Chain Mixers @Brevan Howard Centre for Financial Analysis Annual Crypto Showcasing Event. London, UK, 06/2023
On How ZKP-based Blockchain Mixers Improve, and Worsen User Privacy @The 2023 ACM Web Conference. Austin, USA, 05/2023
Speculative Multipliers on DeFi: Quantifying On-Chain Leverage Risks @FC 2022. Grenada, 05/2022
Defending Against Poisoning Attacks in FL With Blockchain @Ethereum AI Workshop. Rome, Italy, 10/2024
zkFL: ZKP-based Gradient Aggregation for Federated Learning @Decentralised Machine Learning London Night. London, UK, 10/2023