IEEE WIFS'13 - Call for Proposals

The Technical Committee on Information Forensics and Security (IFS-TC) of the IEEE Signal Processing Society (SPS) is inviting proposals for the fifth offering of its flagship workshop (WIFS 2013), to be held in Fall 2013.

The proposal should target an audience around 120-160 attendees. Interested groups and individuals are strongly encouraged to approach the members of the IEEE IFS-TC WIFS subcommittee to openly discuss and improve their proposals . The proposals should be complete and detailed.

Submitted proposals will be evaluated with respect to the following criteria:

1. Dates and deadlines. The proposal should demonstrate that competing workshops and conferences have been taken into account. In particular, IEEE WIFS should be at least 4 months away from IEEE ICASSP. Additionally, dates and deadlines shall be chosen so as to minimize potential conflicts with other events.
2. Location. The proposed location should be convenient to reach and propose modern conference facilities and amenities. There is currently no rotation policy being strictly enforced. This being said, the IFS-TC will work on providing diversity in location (at least the continent) and organizing committee (at least the main chairs) while maintaining the high quality of the workshop.
3. Conference venue. High speed wireless Internet service must be available at the conference venue at no or minimal additional cost to participants. Similarly, availability of power sockets for laptops is highly desirable. A lead hotel must be identified to facilitate interactions between participants. A pro forma quote from that hotel for room rates based on a 50 room block reservation must be part of the proposal. Moreover, the proposal is expected to detail the availability of alternate hotels for all budgets by providing specific references.
4. Organizing committee. The proposal should include a brief biography of the General (co-)Chairs and Technical Program (co-)Chairs to establish their ability to successfully run IEEE WIFS 2013. A number of other roles should also be assigned e.g. the Finance Chair, the Local Arrangements Chair, the Publicity Chair and the Publications Chair.
5. IFS-TC representation. Past and current IFS-TC members may be included in the organizing committee of WIFS. Note that, in this case, current IFS-TC members serving as General or Technical (co-)Chairs will be automatically revoked from the voting process. On the other hand, the Program Committee (PC) of WIFS must include all the members of the IFS-TC. It is recognized that relevant researchers, who are internationally renowned in their scientific community, may be recruited to be part of the PC of WIFS as a means to further raise the profile of excellence of the workshop and to attract additional submissions.
6. Quality of the technical program. WIFS’ technical content shall be aligned with the technical scope of the IFS-TC. Proposals that include plans to address emerging trends or related communities are welcome. Such additions to the scope of the workshop need to be motivated by elaborating on the relevance of such topics, and by discussing their potential to attract new attendees. Proposals that supplement traditional paper sessions through panel sessions, plenary presentations, Ph.D. student focused sessions, contests, and other creative program options are also welcome.
7. Promotion. The bidders shall detail their strategy to generate interest and enthusiasm for the workshop and thus attract attendees beyond those presenting a scientific contribution. This can include for instance targeted advertisement campaigns, ads placement in scientific publications, technical co-sponsorship, dedicated accounts on social networks, etc. Promotion plans that (i) facilitate the involvement of students and/or (ii) foster links with industry are of strong interest to the IFS-TC. Overall, initiatives that increase the prominence and reputation of IEEE WIFS as a key event for the IFS research community will be viewed positively.
8. Workshop logistics. Proposals should demonstrate the ability of the organizers to run the workshop, including the workshop portal (website, registration system), the manuscript management (submission and review system, IEEE Xplore compliant proceedings production), the financial management and the on-site management. It is expected that some of the organizers will have prior experience organizing meetings sponsored by IEEE and thus are familiar with the relevant IEEE policies and procedures.
9. Provisional budget. Per IEEE policy, the provisional budget is required to have a 20% profit. Although they cannot be part of the provisional budget, particular attention will be given to potential additional revenue streams (such as industrial or governmental financial support) which could be exploited to lower registration costs prior to the event and/or to fund invited speakers, best paper awards, travel scholarships, or other benefits.

Full proposals shall be sent by email no later than Friday, June 1st 2012 to the Chair of the IEEE IFS-TC WIFS sub-committee. The selected proposal will be officially announced in December 2012 during the social event of IEEE WIFS 2012 in Tenerife, Spain. Call for papers will be distributed during the event and the workshop website should be up and running at the time.

The IEEE IFS-TC WIFS sub-committee
Gwenaël DOËRR (Chair), Dinei FLORÊNCIO, Fernando PÉREZ-GONZÁLEZ, Anderson ROCHA