Review Process
ISSA uses a double blind peer-review process to ensure the quality of submissions before acceptance. Authors initially submit abstracts to determine if the paper meets the goals and fits into the theme of the conference. The ISSA Program Committee assesses each submission for relevance and fit. Authors are then notified whether their abstracts were accepted, and if so, invited to submit a full paper for peer review.
On the due date, authors submit full papers, anonymised by the authors for the double blind review process. Each paper goes through an administrative review and is assigned to at least three reviewers selected from an international panel of reviewers, in order to confirm that the paper conforms to the specifications and quality for the conference. If a paper does not meet the requirements, the author is asked to make the required changes as indicated by reviewers and asked to resubmit the paper, or to consider submitting the paper to another conference.
A Review Committee is invited to participate, consisting of both local and international experts in the field of Information Security. A process is followed by the Program Committee to allocate papers to reviewers based on their area of expertise. Reviewers are subject matter experts, of which over 50% are international. Reviewers usually have 5 or 6 categories that they are willing to review against. Each reviewer will establish the number of papers they can review in a specific time period and are allowed to bid on the papers they want to review. An automated process allocated papers to each reviewer according to their preferences.
Each paper is reviewed by a minimum of two reviewers in a double
blind review process. Papers are reviewed and rated on a 10 point system with 1
being poor and 10 being excellent as follows:
• Originallity (1-10)
• Significance (1-10)
• Technical quality (1-10)
• Relevance (1-10)
• Presentation (1-10)
• Overall Rating (1-10)
Reviewers’ confidence in their own rating is also taken into account by the algorithm that calculates the final score. Reviewers are encouraged to make anonymous suggestions to the author(s) of the paper.
Based on the final score (1-10), a paper with 5 or below points can be recommended for a poster/research-in-progress session and a 9 to 10 point paper can be put in the “best paper” category. An acceptance rate of between 30% and 40% is expected for the conference.
Authors are notified of the outcome of the review process which includes the anonymous suggestions and recommendations of the reviewers. Authors then have to submit the final version of the paper that will then be included in the formal conference proceedings. The proceedings are published electronically
