Anatomy of a Winning Call for Paper Submission for Nullcon

CFP Board Member Eric Lawrence on the Review Process for Nullcon Berlin 2025 Rahul Neel Mani (@rneelmani) • August 5, 2025

Security conference call for papers, or CFPs, often number in the hundreds, but only a few stand out. Eric Lawrence, principal architect, Defender at Microsoft, and CFP board member for Nullcon Berlin 2025, reviewed proposals and looked for concise, well-crafted submissions that clearly communicated original, timely research.

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Submissions rehashing old topics, showing little effort or written by artificial intelligence, were dismissed quickly. Lawrence said proposals that demonstrated practical applications or new approaches to known issues received higher scores.

"You're really looking for things that are new and interesting, or particularly timely," he said. Submissions that explored real-world vulnerabilities, such as those involving operational infrastructure and went beyond theoretical exploits, added more value.

"A newcomer or even ...