SPACE 2026: Sixteenth International Conference on Security, Privacy and Applied Cryptographic Engineering

December 18-21, 2026 — Bangalore, India

Call for Papers

SPACE 2026 seeks paper submissions presenting novel contributions related to all real-world aspects of security and privacy. We seek articles presenting accessible and compelling results to general computer security researchers. Purely theoretical (e.g., cryptography-focused, with no security/application connections) submissions are not encouraged. The same applies for submissions focusing primarily on blockchains or machine learning.

Topics of Interest

Cryptographic Engineering and Hardware Security

  • Cryptographic implementations (hardware and software)
  • Hardware security primitives such as PUF, TRNG
  • Remote, micro-architectural and physical side-channel attacks and countermeasures
  • Fault attacks and countermeasures
  • Reverse engineering of hardware/software
  • Hardware trojans and countermeasures
  • Formal methods in cryptographic engineering
  • Cryptographic algorithms and protocols targeting embedded devices
  • Trusted execution environments and trusted computing platforms
  • IP protection for hardware/software and technologies for anti-counterfeiting
  • Reconfigurable hardware for cryptography
  • Security for the Internet of Things and cyberphysical systems

Machine Learning Security and Privacy

  • Methods for confidentiality and privacy of data in ML systems
  • Methods for integrity and availability of ML systems
  • Novel attacks on ML systems
  • Verifying security and privacy properties of ML algorithms

Applied Cryptography, Blockchain and Distributed Systems

  • Design and analysis of applied cryptographic primitives and protocols
  • Privacy-enhancing technologies (MPC, FHE, ZKPs)
  • Post-quantum cryptography
  • Cryptography in the wild
  • Blockchain and distributed ledger security
  • Security and privacy of digital identity and Web 3.0

Topics in Security, Privacy and Usability

  • Web and network security
  • Security usability and measurement
  • Software security, formal methods, programming languages
  • Privacy and anonymity

Important Dates

Conference Dates December 18-21, 2026
Venue Bangalore, India

Cycle 1

Cycle 2

Submission Instructions

Please read the instructions below carefully before submitting your paper. Please get in touch with the program chairs at space2026pcchairs@gmail.com for any questions regarding submissions.

The submission server for cycle-1 is located at: https://space2026-cycle-1.hotcrp.com/

Paper Formatting

Technical papers submitted to SPACE 2026 must be written in English. Submitted papers must be in the PDF format, and must comply with the LNCS template at the time of submission. Submitted papers should be at most 20 pages in total (using 10-point font), including the bibliography and appendices (if any).

The program chairs strongly advise authors to pay careful attention to the following requirements:

Submissions not meeting the above requirements risk rejection without consideration of their merits.

Conflicts of Interest (CoI)

The conference requires cooperation from both authors and program committee members to ensure a fair review process. For this purpose, authors must report all program committee members who, in their opinion, have a conflict of interest and therefore may not be able to provide an unbiased review. An author is mandated to declare a conflict with a program committee member if they:

For other forms of conflict, authors must contact the chairs and explain the perceived conflict. Authors also need to notify the program chairs of any other reason or circumstance that creates a risk that professional judgment may be unduly influenced.

The program chairs reserve the right to request further explanation and can remove non-mandatory conflicts at their discretion.

Program committee members (including the program chairs) who have a genuine conflict of interest with a paper, will be excluded from evaluation and discussion of that paper. When a program chair is conflicted, the other co-chairs will be responsible for managing that paper. If all program chairs are in conflict, a committee member will be appointed to handle the paper. Program chairs are not allowed to be authors or co-authors of any submissions.

Anonymous Submissions

SPACE employs a double-blind reviewing process. All submissions should be appropriately anonymized. Author names and affiliations should not appear in the paper. The author should avoid obvious self-references and should appropriately blind them if used. The list of authors cannot be changed (but the order can be) after the submission is made unless approved by the Program Chairs. Publishing the submission on a preprint repository, such as arXiv or the Cryptology ePrint Archive, is allowed; however, the authors should refrain from broadly advertising their results (e.g., social media, seminars, etc.) and must not contact Program Committee members regarding their submitted work.

Double and Concurrent Submissions

Submissions to SPACE 2026 must not substantially overlap with papers that are published or simultaneously submitted to other venues with proceedings (including journals or conferences/workshops). Double submission will result in immediate rejection. We may report detected violations to other conference chairs and journal editors.

Ethical Considerations

The authors should clarify any potential ethical and legal concerns to their results, highly critical vulnerabilities or exploits, etc. The authors should provide evidence (beyond approval of the experiment by their institution) elaborating how they have thoroughly considered such issues. The Program Committee reserves the right to reject a submission if the authors present insufficient evidence that the study has appropriately addressed ethical or relevant legal concerns.

Camera-Ready and Conference Presentation

If a paper is accepted, the author list in the submission cannot be changed when preparing the camera-ready version. Authors of accepted papers must agree with Springer LNCS copyright requirements, and are requested to ensure that their papers are presented at the conference. Each accepted paper requires at least one author to complete a full registration for conference attendance for the paper to be included in the proceedings.

Contact

For any questions related to paper submissions, please contact the PC chairs at: space2026pcchairs@gmail.com