Virág Ilyés completed her bachelor’s degree at Eötvös Loránd University’s Social Studies program, and then received her Msc in Survey Statistics. She finished her Ph.D studies at Corvinus University at the Doctoral School of Sociology and Communication Science. Her doctoral thesis investigated how social ties shape the economic and employment opportunities of individuals. Virág joined the NeTI Lab and ANET Lab (CERS) and in 2021, and works on topics at the intersection of network studies, labour economics and sociology. She previously worked as a data scientist and took part in various projects that utilized automated text analytics, machine learning and data visualization.