MSR4P&S 2026: 4th International Workshop on Mining Software Repositories Applications for Privacy and Security

In conjunction with the 33rd IEEE International Conference on Software Analysis, Evolution and Reengineering (SANER) - https://conf.researchr.org/home/saner-2026

March 17, 2026 (Limassol, Cyprus)

Workshop website: https://msr4ps.github.io

ORGANIZERS
Zadia Codabux - University of Saskatchewan, Canada (zadiacodabux@ieee.org)
Nicolás Díaz Ferreyra - Hamburg University of Technology, Germany (nicolas.diaz-ferreyra@tuhh.de)

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WORKSHOP THEME AND GOALS

Privacy and Security (P&S) are multifaceted and complex research areas spanning different knowledge domains (e.g., engineering, law, and psychology). Challenges in P&S cannot be solely addressed from a single discipline, as they often involve human factors, technological artifacts, and regulatory/legal frameworks. The quest for P&S solutions requires in-depth knowledge and actionable information about its users/stakeholders, vulnerabilities/flaws, and potential attackers.

Mining Software Repositories (MSR) techniques can support this quest by providing a means to understand the P&S dimensions of information systems, thus helping shape privacy- and security-friendly software. This workshop aims to explore the application of MSR at the different stages of P&S engineering.

TOPICS OF INTEREST

- MSR applications for security risk assessment.
- MSR applications for privacy requirements engineering.
- MSR applications for security vulnerability detection.
- Privacy-Enhancing Technologies (PETs) through MSR.
- MSR-based research for safety/security by design.
- Privacy-friendly MSRs (including mixed methods).
- MSR-based mixed-methods on P&S research.
- Privacy requirements in MSR-based research.
- Integrating MSRs into P&S research (empirical).
- Analysis of repositories to mine for P&S research.
- Tools supporting MSR-based research for P&S.
- Datasets used for MSR-based research for P&S.
- MSR applications to P&S assurance.

SPECIAL TOPICS OF INTEREST

Any paper within the scope of the workshop will be considered. Additionally, this year, we welcome submissions focusing on the Large Language Model (LLM)-based methods (including benefits and limitations) for mining security and privacy-related data (e.g., vulnerabilities) from software repositories.

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SUBMISSION DETAILS

Submitted papers must have been neither previously accepted for publication nor concurrently submitted for review in another journal, book, conference, or workshop. All submissions must come in PDF format and conform, at the time of submission, to the IEEE Conference Proceedings Formatting Guidelines: title in 24pt font and full text in 10pt font, LaTEX users must use\documentclass[10pt,conference]{IEEEtran} without including the compsoc or compsocconf option. IEEE paper templates can be accessed from their official location. Also, papers must comply with the IEEE Policy on Authorship. All submissions must be in English. Submissions should be uploaded electronically in PDF format.

PAPER TYPES AND LENGTHS

(I) Regular Papers: up to 8 pages, including references. It must describe original contributions in research and/or practice. Although they can be work-in-progress, the authors must present a clear path forward. These will be given a 15-minute presentation during the workshop.

(II) Short Papers: up to 4 pages, including references. It welcomes position papers, experience reports, work-in-progress, new trends papers, industrial reports, datasets, and tools. These will be given a 7-minute presentation during the workshop.

(III) Posters (no inclusion in the proceedings): a 2-page extended abstract that summarizes (1) the problem addressed by the poster, (2) the approach taken by the authors, and (3) the main results achieved so far.

PEER REVIEW AND ACCEPTANCE

The workshop will follow a double-anonymous peer review process in alignment with SANER's Review Process policies. This means that the papers submitted must not reveal the authors’ identities in any way, omitting the names from the submission and referring to self-citations in the third person.

The program committee will review all submitted papers for technical quality, relevance, significance, and clarity. Workshop papers should be submitted electronically in PDF format through the workshop website.

Accepted (I) FULL-LENGTH and (II) SHORT papers will be published in the SANER 2026 companion proceedings. The extended abstracts of the accepted (III) POSTERS will NOT be included in the proceedings.

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IMPORTANT DATES

Abstract submission: 12 December, 2025 AoE
Paper submission: 18 December, 2025 AoE
Notification: 14 January, 2026 AoE
Camera-ready deadline: Tue 20 January, 2026 AoE

Submission Link: https://easychair.org/my/conference?conf=saner2026