Muhammad Abdullah

I’m a 5th-year Ph.D. student in Computer Science at the Network Architecture Lab (NAL), EPFL, supervised by Prof. Katerina Argyraki. Prior to this, I completed my M.S. in Computer Science at LUMS, where I was part of the Network and Systems Group, working under the guidance of Prof. Ihsan Qazi.

My research interests span Internet Measurement, Network Inference, Content Delivery Networks (CDNs), Adaptive Video Streaming, Causal Inference, and Applied Machine Learning. Broadly, my work lies at the intersection of Networking and Data Science, aiming to make the Internet fair and more transparent.

Currently, my research focuses empirically analyzing disparities in user-perceived performance of services—such as video streaming and social media—deployed on large public clouds. If you have aligned interests, please feel free to reach out via email.

Update: I’m on the job market, actively seeking roles starting in early 2026.

Education

EPFL (École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne), Switzerland
Ph.D. in Computer Science (2021-Present)
Advisor: Katerina Argyraki
Thesis: "CDN Edge Caching as Implicit Differentiation"

LUMS (Lahore University of Management Sciences), Pakistan
M.Sc in Computer Science (2019-21)
CGPA: 3.93/4.00 (Rank: 1/75 - President's Gold Medal)
Thesis: "Causal Inference on the Impact of Android Go on Mobile Web Performance"

NUST (National University of Sciences & Technology), Pakistan
B.Eng in Electrical Engineering (2014-18)
CGPA: 3.70/4.00 (Rank: Top 5%)
Project: "Machine Learning-Based Auto-Inflating Hip Protection Jacket for Elderly"

Experience

Measurement Lab (led by Google) (Jan 2022 - May 2022)
Research Fellow
Advisors: Phillipa Gill (Google), David Choffnes (Northeastern U)

KAIST, South Korea (Sep 2018 - Jan 2019)
Research Assistant
Computer System & Networks Lab

XGrid/PLUMgrid (acquired by VMWare), Pakistan (May 2019 - Aug 2019)
Software Engineer
AWS & Oracle Cloud Deployment Team

CERN, Switzerland (Jul 2017 - Sep 2017)
Software Engineer Intern
Datacenter Networking Team

Publications

• Edge Caching as Differentiation.
  Muhammad Abdullah, Mughees Ur Rehman, Pavlos Nikolopoulos, Katerina Argyraki
  ACM SIGCOMM 2025 (acceptance rate: 16%) — 🏆 Best Student Paper Award

• Caching and Neutrality.
  Muhammad Abdullah, Pavlos Nikolopoulos, Katerina Argyraki
  ACM Hot Topics in Networks (HotNets) 2023

• Localizing Traffic Differentiation.
  Zeinab Shmeis, Muhammad Abdullah, Pavlos Nikolopoulos, Katerina Argyraki, David Choffnes , Phillipa Gill
  ACM Internet Measurement Conference (IMC) 2023 (acceptance rate: 25%)

• Causal Impact of Android Go on Mobile Web Performance.
  Muhammad Abdullah, Zafar Qazi, Ihsan Qazi
  ACM Internet Measurement Conference (IMC) 2022 (acceptance rate: 26%)

• Rethinking Web for Affordability and Inclusion.
  Ihsan Qazi, Zafar Qazi, Ayesha Ali, Muhammad Abdullah, Rumaisa Habib
  ACM Hot Topics in Networks (HotNets) 2021

• Using Application Layer Banner Data to Automatically Identify IoT Devices.
  Talha Javed , Muhammad Haseeb , Muhammad Abdullah , Mobin Javed
  ACM SIGCOMM CCR 2020
  

Teaching

• Head TA — COM407: TCP/IP networking (Fall ‘24, EPFL)
• TA (Networking Labs) — CS202: Computer Systems (Spring ‘24, EPFL)
• TA — CS332: Introduction to Database Systems (Spring ‘23, EPFL)
• Head TA — COM208: Computer Networks (Fall ‘22, EPFL)
• Head TA — CS334: Principles and Techniques of Data Science (Spring ‘21, LUMS)
  

Talks

• “Edge Caching as Differentiation”
  SIGCOMM 2025 at Coimbra, Portugal (Sep 2025)
• “Causal impact of Android go on mobile web performance”
  IMC 2022 at Nice, France (Oct 2022)
• “A Primer on Zeek IDS”
  National Centre for Cyber Security, Pakistan (Oct 2020)
• “Network Automation with Brocade Workflow Composer”
  CERN Lightning Talks, Switzerland (Jul 2017)
  

Awards & Honors

• SIGCOMM 2025 Best Student Paper Award (Dec 2021)
• Research Fellowship from M-Lab (led by Google) for our work on localizing network neutrality violations (Dec 2021)
• Gold Medal Awarded by the President of Pakistan for securing overall 1st position in MS program (Jun 2021)
• EDIC Computer Science Fellowship, EPFL (Jan 2021)
• Dean’s High Achievers Award, NUST (Jan 2018)
• One of the 40 students selected globally for KAIST Electrical Engineering Camp (Jan 2018)
• One of the 37 students selected globally for CERN’s Openlab Internship Program (acceptance rate: 2.3%) (Jan 2017)