José González Cabañas was born in Madrid, in 1994. He is currently a Postdoctoral researcher at the UC3M-Santander Big Data Institute. He earned his PhD 'Cum Laude' in Telematics Engineering in 2021, received his MSc in Telematics Engineering in 2017 and obtained his BSc in Communication System Engineering in 2016 holding the best academic record of his promotion; all of them from Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M).
José pursued his PhD holding an FPU fellowship from the Spanish Ministry of Education.
He published papers in prestigious international conferences such as ACM CHI, Usenix Security and a Runner-Up paper for the Best Paper award at ACM IMC. He has published in JCR Q1 magazines such as IEEE Access and the COVER of Communications of the ACM. He has also worked in European H2020 projects.
José's research interests include Online Advertising, Privacy, Web Transparency, Internet Measurements and Social Networks.
Finally, his research has been highlighted by different international media (newspapers, online, radio & TV) such as Financial Times, Newscientist, LeFigaro, TheTimes, El País, Antena 3 Noticias, ABC, LaSexta, Cadena Cope, etc.

Link to my CV

• How resilient is the Open Web to the COVID-19 pandemic?
  José González-Cabañas, Patricia Callejo, Pelayo Vallina, Ángel Cuevas, Rubén Cuevas and Antonio Fern´ndez-Anta
  Telematics and Informatics 2021
  Volume 64, 101692. URL https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tele.2021.101692


• Unique on Facebook: Formulation and Evidence of (Nano)targeting Individual Users with non-PII Data
  José González-Cabañas, Ángel Cuevas, Rubén Cuevas, Juan López-Fernández and David García
  ACM Internet Measurement Conference (IMC '21)
  Virtual Event, USA 2021. URL: https://doi.org/10.1145/3487552.3487861

• Digital Contact Tracing: Large-Scale Geolocation Data as an Alternative to Bluetooth-Based Apps Failure
  José González-Cabañas, Ángel Cuevas, Rubén Cuevas, and Martin Maier
  Electronics 2021, Special Issue: Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) to Deal with COVID-19
  Volume 10(9), URL: https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics10091093

• Does Facebook Use Sensitive Data for Advertising Purposes?
  José González Cabañas, Ángel Cuevas, Aritz Arrate, Rubén Cuevas
  Communications of the ACM 2020
  Volume 64(1), 62-69 URL: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3426361

• Malvertising in Facebook: Analysis, Quantification and Solution
  Aritz Arrate, José González Cabañas, Ángel Cuevas, Rubén Cuevas
  MDPI Electronics 2020
  Volume 9(8), 1332 URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2079-9292/9/8/1332

• Large-scale analysis of user exposure to online advertising on Facebook
  Aritz Arrate, José González Cabañas, Ángel Cuevas, Rubén Cuevas, María Calderón
  IEEE Access 2019
  Volume 7, 11959-11971 URL: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/8611067

• Unveiling and Quantifying Facebook Exploitation of Sensitive Personal Data for Advertising Purposes
  José González Cabañas, Ángel Cuevas, Rubén Cuevas
  Proceedings of the 27th USENIX Security Symposium (USENIX Security 18)
  USENIX Association, Baltimore, Maryland USA, 479-495 2018. URL: https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity18/sec18-cabanas.pdf

• FDVT: Data Valuation Tool for Facebook Users
  José González Cabañas, Ángel Cuevas, Rubén Cuevas
  Proceedings of the 2017 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '17)
  ACM, Denver, Colorado USA, 3799-3809. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3025453.3025903

• 01/10/2022 - José González is awarded with the Premio Talento y Tecnología 2022 to the best PhD thesis in Ethical and Legal Aspects in the Technology Field granted by the Madrid City Council.
• 30/09/2022 - José González participates in the European Researchers' Night.
• 14/09/2022 - José González participates in Databeers Madrid XXXIII.
• 09/11/2021 - Facebook anounces the removal of sensitive ad targeting options. We quantified and disclosed the use of sensitive ad targeting options in our paper "Does Facebook Use Sensitive Data for Advertising Purposes?"
• 05/11/2021 - José González appears in Conectando Puntos Podcast, Episode 174.
• 02/11/2021 - Our paper on Nanotargeting Facebook users with non-PII is selected as one of the Runner-Up papers for the Best Paper Award at ACM IMC 2021.
• 20/10/2021 - El País newspaper talks about our work on Nanotargeting Facebook users with non-PII
• 15/10/2021 - TechCrunch describes in an article our work on Nanotargeting Facebook users with non-PII
• 14/10/2021 - Dr Lukasz Olejnik, an independent privacy researcher and consultant, describes our work on Nanotargeting Facebook users with non-PII as among the top 10 most important privacy research results of this decade.
• 07/10/2021 - José González Cabañas defends his thesis at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid.
• 01/01/2021 - Our work "Does Facebook Use Sensitive Data for Advertising Purposes?" is the cover of the Communications of the ACM magazine.
• 22/12/2020 - José González Cabañas interviewed at Communications of the ACM regarding our work "Does Facebook Use Sensitive Data for Advertising Purposes?".
• 13/08/2020 - Our paper "Malvertising in Facebook: Analysis, Quantification and Solution" accepted for publication at MDPI Electronics
• 09/12/2019 - Our paper "Does Facebook Use Sensitive Data for Advertising Purposes?" accepted for publication at Communications of the ACM
• 07/11/2019 - We are mentioned by El País for providing data of the activity of Spanish political parties on Facebook.
• 24/08/2019 - Newscientist covers our work on Facebook Use of Sensitive Personal Data around the world.
• 30/07/2019 - El País covers our work on Facebook Use of Sensitive Personal Data around the world.
• 25/04/2019 - Article in the newspaper El País where we are mentioned for providing data of the activity of Spanish political parties on Facebook.
• 28/01/2019 - We have been awarded the Research Prize Emilio Aced by Agencia Española de Proteccion de Datos for our research work revealing the portion of users assigned potentially sensitive interests in Facebook
• 23/12/2018 - FDVT highlighted in Antena 3 TV
• 10/12/2018 - Our paper "Large-scale analysis of user exposure to online advertising on Facebook" accepted for publication at IEEE Access
• 28/06/2018 - Our paper "Unveiling and Quantifying Facebook Exploitation of Sensitive Personal Data for Advertising Purposes" accepted for publicaiton at USENIX Security 18.
• 05/03/2018 - Le Figaro covers our work on Facebook Use of Sensitive Personal Data in the European Union.
• 04/03/2018 - The Times includes an article about our work on Facebook Use of Sensitive Personal Data in the European Union.
• 21/02/2018 - Financial Times talks about our work on Facebook Use of Sensitive Personal Data in the European Union.
• 16/02/2018 - Newscientist covers our work on Facebook Use of Sensitive Personal Data in the European Union.
• 14/02/2018 - Release of our new work "Facebook Use of Sensitive Data for Advertising in Europe".
• 15/11/2017 - José González Cabañas starts his PhD studies holding an FPU fellowship from the Spanish Ministry of Education
• 12/07/2017 - José González Cabañas finishes his MSc in Telematic Engineering
• 06/01/2017 - Our paper "FDVT: Data Valuation Toool for Facebook Users" accepted for publicaiton at ACM CHI '17.
• 17/12/2016 - José González Cabañas won the 1st prize for the best Bachelor Final Project 2015/2016 in Spain by the COITT based on the work he did on the FDVT project.
• 16/12/2016 - Dr. Rubén Cuevas talks about FDVT in Equipo de Investigación at La Sexta (in Spanish. Starts at 48:54).
• 30/11/2016 - Interview at Poniendo las Calles (Cadena Cope) to talk about our FDVT tool (in Spanish)
• 28/11/2016 - José González Cabañas receives the Best BSc Academic Performance Record award by UC3M
• 19/11/2016 - The UC3M team formed by José González Cabañas and Dr. Ángel Cuevas won the 3rd Prize at DTL Conference '16 Hackaton.
• 08/11/2016 - Interview at La Ventana (Cadena Ser) to talk about our FDVT tool (in Spanish)
• 02/11/2016 - FDVT highlighted in more than 100 news media (mostly Spanish). Some exampels are: El País, ABC, El Mundo, El Confidencial, TVE, etc.
• 02/10/2016 - FDVT highlighted at La Vanguardia Magazine article Nada es Gratis.
• 01/10/2016 - FDVT public release. Visit fdvt.org for more information.
• 06/07/2016 - José González Cabañas finishes his BSc degree in Communication System Engineering

• Web Analytics:
  
  • 2022-2023 · BSc in Data Science Engineering · 4th course · Group 96 
• Intermediate knowledge of Spreadsheets:
  
  • 2022-2023 · BSc in Law · 2nd course · Group 13 
• Advanced knowledge of Spreadsheets:
  
  • 2021-2022 · BSc in Industrial Technologies Engineering · 2nd course · Group 725 
• Switching:
  
  • 2021-2022 · BSc in Mobile and Space Communications Engineering · 3rd course · Group 61 
  • 2021-2022 · BSc in Telematics Engineering · 3rd course · Groups 71 
  • 2020-2021 · BSc in Telecommunication Technologies Engineering · 3rd course · Group 91 
  • 2020-2021 · BSc in Telematics Engineering · 3rd course · Groups 71, 72 
  • 2020-2021 · BSc in Mobile and Space Communications Engineering · 3rd course · Group 61 
  • 2019-2020 · BSc in Telecommunication Technologies Engineering · 3rd course · Group 95 
  • 2019-2020 · BSc in Telematics Engineering · 3rd course · Group 71 
  • 2019-2020 · BSc in Mobile and Space Communications Engineering · 3rd course · Group 61 
  • 2018-2019 · BSc in Telematics Engineering · 3rd course · Group 71 
  • 2018-2019 · BSc in Communication System Engineering · 3rd course · Group 61 
• Computer Networks:
  
  • 2019-2020 · BSc in Data Science and Engineering · 3rd course · Groups 96, 97 
  • 2018-2019 · BSc in Computer Science and Engineering · 3rd course · Groups 81, 83, 89 
  • 2016-2017 · BSc in Computer Science and Engineering · 3rd course · Groups 81, 83, 89 
• Access Networks and Shared Media:
  
  • 2016-2017 · BSc in Telecommunication Technologies Engineering · 2nd course · Groups 91, 95 

• Adscom Research Group (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid)

• Premio Talento y Tecnología 2022 to the best PhD thesis in Ethical and Legal Aspects in the Technology Field by the Madrid City Council
  
  • October 2022 · Madrid City Council
• Research Prize Emilio Aced by Agencia Española de Proteccion de Datos
  
  • January 2019 · Spanish Data Protection Agency
• FPU fellowship
  
  • October 2017 · Spanish Ministry of Education
• Premio Liberalización de las Telecomunicaciones (Best Spanish BSc Thesis)
  
  • November 2016 · COITT · Telecommunication Systems Engineering
• Best Academic Performance Record Award
  
  • November 2016 · Universidad Carlos III de Madrid · BSc in Communication System Engineering
• 3rd Prize DTL Hackathon 2016
  
  • November 2016 · Data Transparency Lab · Columbia Univeristy New York

• Rocío Gómez: BSc Thesis
  
  • July 2017 · BSc in Communication System Engineering · Co-advisor: Dr. Ángel Cuevas
• Alejandro Moratilla: BSc Thesis
  
  • July 2017 · BSc in Computer Science and Engineering · Co-advisor: Dr. Ángel Cuevas