The Informatics Institute in cooperation with Vivat Insurance (Zwitserleven & Reaal) is looking for a  PhD candidate in Fraud Analytics using Machine Learning.

The PhD research position focuses on automated profile identification of users based on their social media behaviour across several modalities, with particular emphasis on textual and visual analysis. To this end, the research in this project will build on deep learning methodologies that allow for the integration of multimodal evidence.

The research in this project aims to break new ground in multimedia analysis by achieving:

• textual understanding beyond the topical level by statistical modelling of stylistic properties;
• visual understanding of images based on joint analysis of visual sentiment and semantic content;
• modelling the interaction between textual and visual evidence to automatically generate user profiles .

Successful applicants will:

• publish and present their research findings at international top-tier conferences and/or in leading journals;
• make significant contributions to advancing the state of the art in multimedia analysis.

This research is part of the collaboration between Amsterdam Data Science and VIVAT Insurance (Zwitserleven & Reaal).

• A Master’s degree in the area of business, econometrics, economics, data science, or a related discipline (such as engineering, computer science or applied mathematics);

• excellent grades and a strong interest in quantitative research methods, modeling and/or statistics;
• considerable knowledge/experience and willingness to work with R, MATLAB, or Python (one of these environments);
• the drive to publish in top academic journals in management and business science;
• well-developed analytical skills, strong organization and communication skills, an entrepreneurial mind set, and perseverance;
• the ability to work independently in developing the research project;
• mastery of both written and spoken English.

In addition to these formal requirements, candidates are selected on the basis of their CVs, academic references, grade overviews, and interview(s) with the potential supervisor(s).

Research experience on touchpoint attribution is preferred but not required.

Candidates outside of Marketing are encouraged to apply.

The appointment will be on a temporary basis for a period of 4 years (initial appointment will be for a period of 18 months and after satisfactory evaluations it can be extended to a total duration of 4 years) and should lead to a dissertation (PhD thesis). Periodic evaluations will be held after 9 and 14 months. An educational plan will be drafted that includes attendance of courses, summer and/or winter schools and (international) meetings. The PhD candidate is also expected to assist in teaching of undergraduates.

The gross monthly salary will range from €2,222 in the first year to €2,840 in the last year. The Collective Employment Agreement (CAO) for Dutch Universities is applicable.

What do we offer you?

Some of the things we have to offer:

• a unique community of Data Science researchers;
• a friendly and informal working environment;
• high-level of interaction;
• location in the city centre;
• international environment (10+ nationalities in the group);
• access to high-end computing facilities (cluster with CPU 4,000+ cores and 50+ GPUs).

University of Amsterdam

With over 5,000 employees, 30,000 students and a budget of more than 600 million euros, the University of Amsterdam (UvA) is an intellectual hub within the Netherlands. Teaching and research at the UvA are conducted within seven faculties: Humanities, Social and Behavioural Sciences, Economics and Business, Law, Science, Medicine and Dentistry. Housed on four city campuses in or near the heart of Amsterdam, where disciplines come together and interact, the faculties have close links with thousands of researchers and hundreds of institutions at home and abroad.   The UvA’s students and employees are independent thinkers, competent rebels who dare to question dogmas and aren’t satisfied with easy answers and standard solutions. To work at the UvA is to work in an independent, creative, innovative and international climate characterised by an open atmosphere and a genuine engagement with the city of Amsterdam and society.

http://www.uva.nl/en/home

Informatics Institute

The Informatics Institute (IvI) is part of the Faculty of Science. The Faculty of Science occupies a leading position internationally in its fields of research and participates in a large number of cooperative programs with universities, research institutes and businesses. The faculty has a student body of around 3,000 and 1,500 members of staff, spread over eight research institutes and a number of faculty-wide support services. A considerable part of the research is made possible by external funding from Dutch and international organizations and the private sector. The Faculty of Science offers thirteen Bachelor's degree programs and eighteen Master’s degree programs in the fields of the exact sciences, computer science and information studies, and life and earth sciences.

Since September 2010, the whole faculty has been housed in a brand new building at the Science Park in Amsterdam. The creation of the faculty has made Science Park one of the largest centres of academic research in the Netherlands.

The Informatics institute is one of the large research institutes with the faculty, with a focus on complex information systems divided in two broad themes: “Computational Systems” and “Intelligent Systems.” The institute has a prominent international standing and is active in a dynamic scientific area, with a strong innovative character and an extensive portfolio of externally funded projects.

http://ivi.uva.nl/