October 24, 2026 — Bradley University, Peoria, IL
The Call for Papers for BSides Peoria 2026 is officially open, and we want to hear from you.
If you’ve got a cool hack you’ve been sitting on, hard-won lessons from a project that went sideways, a fresh take on a threat, or just a perspective the community should be hearing, this is your invitation.
What we’re looking for
Pretty much anything cybersecurity. Some examples of the kinds of talks we love:
- Red team tradecraft and offensive research
- Breaking (or defending) AI systems
- Blue team war stories and detection engineering
- Threat intel and threat actor analysis
- Physical security, hardware hacking, RF
- Social engineering and the human side of security
- Policy, compliance, and the parts of the job nobody wants to talk about
- Career paths, industry critiques, and community-building
If your topic isn’t on that list, submit it anyway. That list is meant to spark ideas, not fence them in.
First-time speakers, we especially want you
BSides has always been the place where new voices get on stage for the first time. If you’ve been thinking about speaking but haven’t pulled the trigger, this is the venue. Our review board is friendly, our audience is engaged, and nobody’s going to grill you like it’s a keynote at Black Hat. Submit.
If you want feedback on your idea before you formally submit, hit us on the ILCF Slack and we’ll help you shape it.
The details
- Format: 45-minute sessions, up to 2 speakers per talk
- Submissions close: August 31, 2026 at 11:59 PM Central
- Reviews: Rolling, so the earlier you submit, the earlier you’ll hear back
- Cost: Free for speakers (though we can’t cover travel or hotel)
- Submit at: sessionize.com/bsides-peoria-2026
Full terms and speaker agreement are on the Sessionize page.
What we’re not looking for
Vendor pitches. If your talk is a thinly-veiled sales deck, we’ll spot it and pass on it. Bring us the actual technical work or the actual lessons learned. That’s what our audience is here for.
Questions?
Hit us at hello at bsides peoria dot com or reply on whichever social post brought you here. We’ll get you sorted.
Submit your talk: sessionize.com/bsides-peoria-2026
See you in October.
