Sepideh Abedini

My name is Sepideh Abedini. I am a master’s student at the University of Waterloo, under the supervision of Prof. M. Tamer Özsu at the Data Systems Group. Currently an Associate Applied ML Engineer at the Vector Institute, developing privacy-aware text-to-SQL and PII detection pipelines using abstraction techniques, LLMs, and synthetic data.

My research focuses on the application of LLMs in Data Management Systems and Data Privacy.

In my free time, I enjoy socializing and engaging in conversations with people to learn new perspectives. I love playing badminton, traveling, watching movies, and reading novels. 

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Education

• MMath in Computer Science, University of Waterloo
• B.S. in Computer Science, Sharif University of Technology

Experiences

• Associate Applied ML Specialist - Vector Institute

  • Developing a context-aware PII detection pipeline combining NER, rule-based regex filters, and SLMs to identify and selectively mask sensitive spans while preserving utility in downstream QA and RAG systems.
  • Creating a synthetic dataset for PII detection with context-driven relevance labels that indicate whether each PII is essential or redundant for downstream tasks.
  • Implemented MaskSQL, a privacy preserving Text-to-SQL pipeline that abstracts sensitive schema and value tokens before LLM inference to protect user data under customizable privacy policies (accepted at NeurIPS 2025 Regulatable MLWorkshop)
    

• Researcher Intern - Vector Institute

  • Designing a scalable framework for detecting and redacting PII in unstructured textual data
    

• Research Assistant - University of Waterloo

  • Developing an in-depth benchmark to evaluate and identify errors in NL-to-SQL models
    

• Teaching Assistant

  • Designing Functional Programs , University of Waterloo
  • Computers and Computer Systems , University of Waterloo
  • Computer Programming 2 , University of Waterloo
  • Computer Programming 1 , University of Waterloo
  • Basic Programming: C++ , Sharif University of Technology
  • Programming Java , Sharif University of Technology

• Machine Learning Engineer Intern - JobVision

  • Developed an AI recommender system for job-seekers
  • Implementing content-based and collaborative filtering algorithms

Honors & Awards

• Awarded the International Master’s Award of Excellence (IMAE)
• Awarded Full Scholarship based on National Universities Entrance Exam