NDSS Submission

This is the deadline-week skill: the paper exists, the cycle is chosen, and the job is to get it into HotCRP without handing the PC a reason to discard it unread. NDSS 2027's summer cycle ran through ndss27-summer.hotcrp.com; confirm the fall cycle's own site rather than assuming the URL pattern (待核实 in this pack's source map).

The clock

Deadlines are 11:59 PM Anywhere-on-Earth (UTC-12) — the most forgiving timezone, which is exactly why missing it is unforgivable. Fall 2027 cycle: papers due August 19, 2026. Upload a complete candidate PDF a day early; HotCRP allows revision until the deadline, and a placeholder in the system beats a perfect PDF stuck in a build error at 11:58.

Hard-gate audit (any failure = fix before upload)

• Template: current NDSS template, unmodified — no geometry, spacing, or font surgery.
• Length: ≤13 pages of body; Ethics Considerations, references, and appendices sit outside the count and behind the body/ethics/references order the CFP prescribes.
• Language: English; PDF compiles on someone else's machine, fonts embedded.
• Anonymity (double-blind, per the 2027 CFP):
  • no author names/affiliations anywhere, including headers and the PDF's metadata (pdfinfo; check Author, Creator, and attached-file fields);
  • self-citations in third person; no "our earlier system [12]";
  • acknowledgments, grant numbers, and lab codenames removed;
  • artifact links point at anonymized hosting, not institutional GitLab;
  • figures and screenshots checked for usernames, hostnames, watermarks.
• Ethics readiness: if the work touches live systems, users, or vulnerabilities — the Ethics Considerations section exists, the disclosure state is described truthfully, and the paper can face the Ethics Review Board as-is. IRB paperwork alone is not the answer the venue accepts.
• Cap and overlap: every coauthor is on ≤6 submissions this cycle (12/year), and this paper does not majorly overlap a paper rejected in this symposium's earlier cycle, nor sit simultaneously under review elsewhere.

Desk-reject triage

HotCRP field discipline

Abstract, title, topics, and conflicts steer reviewer assignment — treat them as targeting, not paperwork. The abstract in the form must match the PDF verbatim (mismatches surface at Round 1 and read as sloppiness). Declare conflicts by the CFP's definition, completely: a missed conflict discovered later taints the review; an invented one to dodge a feared reviewer is misconduct. List every coauthor with correct emails at submission — quiet author-list edits after the deadline are a chairs-permission matter at security venues, not an author right.

Final 48 hours, in order

T-48h  freeze content; branch the repo (submission tag)
T-36h  format pass: template diff, page count, reference/appendix order
T-30h  anonymity pass: metadata, links, figures, self-citations, acks
T-24h  ethics pass: section present, disclosure statements current TODAY
       (a vendor reply yesterday can invalidate a sentence written last week)
T-20h  upload candidate PDF to HotCRP; fill all fields; save
T-12h  cold read of the compiled-from-HotCRP download (not your local file)
T-2h   final re-upload if needed; screenshot the confirmation

After the button

Nothing more is owed until the early-reject notification (fall: September 25, 2026). Use the gap to pre-draft rebuttal scaffolding (ndss-author-response) and to keep the disclosure process moving — the interactive discussion phase will ask what happened since submission, and "the vendor patched in October" is a good answer only if you kept the process alive.

Output format

[Upload state] candidate in HotCRP? fields complete?
[Hard gates] template / length / anonymity / ethics / cap+overlap — pass or blocker
[Triage] findings mapped to the table above, with owners
[Clock] hours to AoE deadline; next checkpoint