A lawyer for Xiaofeng Wang and his wife says they are "safe" after FBI searches of their homes and Wang's sudden dismissal from Indiana University, where he taught for over 20 years.

A prominent computer scientist who has spent 20 years publishing academic papers on cryptography, privacy, and cybersecurity has gone incommunicado, had his professor profile, email account, and phone number removed by his employer, Indiana University, and had his homes raided by the FBI. No one knows why.

According to the American Association of University Professors, Professor Xiaofeng Wang has been terminated by IU.

Unverified statement circulating among Wang’s colleagues says case linked research grant in China about seven years ago.

Attorney Jason Covert’s statement is the first official word about the fate of the professor, XiaoFeng Wang, and his wife, Nianli Ma, since March 28, when the FBI and Department of Homeland Security carried out simultaneous searches on two homes associated with the couple, which was the same day the university terminated his employment.

A US-based cybersecurity professor and his wife have reportedly disappeared after they were fired by their university employer and their homes were raided by federal authorities, amid reports of an investigation into potential professional misconduct.

It’s like XiaoFeng Wang never existed during his 21 years at Indiana University. In conjunction with FBI raids at homes Wang shares in Bloomington and Carmel with his wife, IU

David Shipley, head of Canadian security awareness training provider Beauceron Security, was responding to a warning released by the FBI Denver field office earlier this month about the growth of a scam that uses free online document converter tools to steal information or load malware onto an unsuspecting user’s computer.

The FBI searched homes in Bloomington and Carmel belonging to an IU professor and an IU Libraries analyst Friday. The agency declined to comment on the nature of the search. An IU spokesperson did not say whether the professor, Xiaofeng Wang at the Luddy ...