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Call for proposals: COSCUP 2026 community track

Anonymity Networks Community focuses on anonymity, privacy, and digital security. We work to build practical guidance for Chinese-speaking audiences and to support localized tooling and collaborative knowledge. Our outreach and documentation center on the open-source projects Tor, Tails, and OONI.

Anonymity Networks Community 2026 call for proposals hero image

COSCUP has long organized an annual conference for open-source communities. Many anonymity and anti-censorship tools also grow as free software, relying on community review, documentation, and infrastructure work. This year our community was accepted for a COSCUP 2026 community track (two days). Sessions and workshops will run on August 8 and 9 at National Taiwan University of Science and Technology (NTUST). We are now accepting proposals. Researchers, practitioners, NGO staff, civic-tech developers, and community members are welcome to share observations, hands-on tool use, and field experience in line with the open-source conference setting.

Submit on Pretalx

CFP deadline extended to May 23, 2026 (AoE)

We have extended the CFP deadline to May 23, 2026 (AoE) so more speakers have time to prepare proposals. We will keep inviting researchers, practitioners, NGO staff, developers, and community members to submit, and we welcome readers to forward the call to anyone who fits. If you are still drafting a proposal, use this extra window to finish it. If you know someone who would be a good speaker, please pass along the call or make an introduction.

Event and timeline

  • Dates: August 8 and 9, 2026, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology (NTUST)
  • Joint CFP deadline: May 23, 2026 (AoE) (extended from May 9)
  • Acceptance announcements: June 9, 2026
  • Schedule: Pretalx scheduling to be completed by June 23, 2026

If the organizers publish updates, follow the latest posts on the official COSCUP blog.

Goals for 2026

  • Build shared knowledge: Turn anonymity and privacy guidance into adoptable open documentation (with suitable open licensing) so everyday users face a lower barrier to practice.
  • Connect tech communities with civic contexts: Give developers, researchers, NGOs, journalists, civil-society groups, and tech community members a chance to meet and talk across domains.
  • Keep local collaboration going: Support campus relay nodes (Tor Relay), teaching and materials for the portable anonymous environment (Tails), personal privacy protection, censorship measurement (OONI), and lawful anonymous payments (including on-chain tools such as stablecoins) through local implementation and discussion.

Topics

Use the following as orientation when you propose. Content is not limited to these bullets. Formats stay open: talks, blended teaching workshops, experience reports, and tool demos are all welcome. If your topic ties to free software or open-source projects (upstream contribution, issues, documentation, localization, licensing, reproducible builds, open data, open standards), say so briefly in the proposal to align with COSCUP’s open-source context. The main threads are personal privacy, anonymous networks, anonymous payments, and international participation. Cross-cutting proposals are encouraged.

Personal privacy

Personal privacy matters because it shapes how safely people use the internet, manage identity data, and keep everyday autonomy. Under cross-border travel, tourism, short stays, or migration, device checks, network conditions, account and payment records, cloud sync, and data retention can sharply raise risk. We welcome proposals focused on personal privacy that share understandable, actionable methods for real situations.

Anonymous networks and internet freedom

Anonymous networks and internet freedom are long-standing priorities for the community. They bear on whether people under surveillance, blocking, or differential routing can still connect reliably, communicate safely, and keep space for information flow and expression. We want proposals on practical anonymous connectivity, risk reading in censored environments, infrastructure participation, and experience with Tor, Tails, and OONI, including teaching design, measurement methods, and local outreach.

Anonymous payments

Anonymous payments matter because financial records often tie to real identity, social ties, and movement, shaping safety for individuals and organizations. For civil-society and advocacy groups, this also covers how to protect supporters, donors, and beneficiaries under lawful conditions while balancing transparency and internal risk. We want proposals on anonymous donations and payment design, cryptocurrency tools in different contexts and their limits, and cryptocurrency law and compliance (regulatory compliance, accounting, cross-border rules, audit, and risk disclosure).

International participation

International participation matters because local communities can work with global organizations to turn tools, knowledge, and advocacy into action on the ground, while feeding experience from Taiwan back into international networks. We want proposals on collaborating with Tor Project, Tails, OONI, EFF, and related projects, and on linking volunteers, translation, documentation, relays, measurement, and outreach so cross-border work becomes real participation.

Below are further angles on anonymity, privacy, and internet freedom, including extensions of the themes above. Use them for ideas; content is not limited to this list.

Keywords for brainstorming (not exhaustive)
  • Privacy risk when traveling across borders, tourism, short stays, or migration: device checks, public Wi‑Fi, account recovery, cloud sync, data retention
  • Personal privacy practice: identity and account management, two-factor authentication, DNS / VPN / proxy, separating work and personal identity
  • De-identification and metadata in files, images, chat, and cloud collaboration; sources of accidental leaks and how to reduce risk
  • Digital security and exercise design for NGOs, independent journalists, newsrooms, or frontline roles in high-risk settings
  • Whistleblower protection, anonymous reporting, secure communication and file exchange workflows
  • Tails (including integration with Tor and built-in tools), OnionShare, and related open anonymous toolchains: teaching, verifiable downloads, Chinese-language docs or curricula
  • Snowflake, bridges, and relays in the global anonymous network: volunteering, risk communication, and policy conversations inside organizations
  • OONI list maintenance, AS coverage and measurement gaps, local measurement and data collaboration, volunteer training and data storytelling
  • Anonymous connectivity and reading censored environments: Tor relay operations, circumvention strategy, observability, and explaining misuse risk
  • ISP blocking, network resilience, real-name rules and identity data, cross-border data exchange, and human-rights framing in internet freedom and policy advocacy (technical or advocacy)
  • Anonymous payments and donations: data exposure along payment paths, protecting supporters, organizational receipts and public communication
  • Cryptocurrency law and compliance: regulatory compliance, accounting, cross-border rules, audit, risk disclosure, and jurisdiction-specific limits
  • Making international collaboration concrete: working with Tor Project, Tails, OONI, EFF, and tying together translation, docs, relays, measurement, and local outreach
  • Terminology and translation for anonymity and privacy in Chinese contexts, primers and handouts, local cases and culture, glossaries
  • Second devices, backups and destruction workflows, digital and physical security when devices are seized or inspected (within lawful bounds)
  • Cypherpunk ideas, zero-knowledge proofs, privacy-enhancing protocols, and open-source project status and applications
  • Open-source licensing, reproducible builds, supply chain and download verification, community trust, and governance
  • Other topics closely tied to anonymity, privacy, internet freedom, and digital security that help participants take action

Cross-community collaboration: Anonymity Networks Community × ETHTaipei

This year we are partnering with ETHTaipei (Taipei Ethereum Community) on program coordination. Both communities approach anonymous payments from different angles. To ensure submissions reach the most fitting audience, we will review proposals together:

  • Application-oriented and introductory talks: prioritized for the Anonymity Networks Community track
  • Technical and protocol-level talks: may be moved to the ETHTaipei blockchain track

You do not need to decide which track to submit to — we will discuss placement with speakers during the review process. Both communities will cross-promote their schedules, so attendees can move between tracks to follow related topics across the event.

On Day 2 (Aug 9), both communities plan to co-organize a dedicated session on Anonymous Payments. Speakers and attendees interested in this topic are especially encouraged to take note. If you have a relevant proposal, feel free to mention in your submission notes that you are interested in being included in the cross-community session.

How to submit

Submit through the official COSCUP 2026 Pretalx.

Submitting to the Anonymity Networks Community track

In the form, set “Proposal topic” to “匿名網路社群 anoni.net” so your submission enters this community track for review.

Please state clearly in your proposal:

  1. Topic area: which “Topics” section above it maps to
  2. Format: talk, workshop, demo, other
  3. Audience: general public, technical community, NGO staff, or mixed
  4. Duration: expected length (30 or 50 minutes)
  5. Demo needs (if any): venue or equipment requirements

Questions welcome at whisper@anoni.net.

Submit on Pretalx

Ethics and open licensing

Everything we share assumes lawful use. Workshops and sessions do not support money laundering, tax evasion, or other illegal activity. Proposals involving cryptocurrency, coin mixers, or anonymity tools should aim at education and risk awareness, and remind audiences that laws differ by place; attendees must verify what is lawful where they are.

Aligned with COSCUP’s open-source and open collaboration values: the conference expects speakers to release shareable materials, slides, and demos under open licenses per official rules so the community can preserve, redistribute, and adapt them. If your proposal includes third-party material, unpublished research, or sections that should not be public, note the scope and limits in the proposal or before the session. Actual license terms, delivery timing, and exceptions follow the official COSCUP announcements and the latest text on Pretalx.

About COSCUP

COSCUP (Conference for Open Source Coders, Users, and Promoters) is an annual conference run by Taiwan’s open-source communities, focused on open-source code and culture so developers, users, and promoters can meet in one place. See the COSCUP website for more.

On this track, Anonymity Networks Community anoni.net wants tech communities and civil-society groups, advocates, and frontline workers to meet, talk, and keep collaborating, bringing tools and field experience back to their own contexts.

The conference is free to attend and not run for ticket revenue, which keeps the barrier to entry relatively low. That setting suits sessions on anonymity and privacy within a welcoming open-source atmosphere, and helps attendees who prefer to participate quietly, under a pseudonym, or with minimal personal data disclosure (still subject to conference and venue rules).