Coronavirus/COVID-19 and USENIX Conferences

Reviewed 27 April 2020

After thorough consideration, and with the safety of our attendees, speakers, volunteers, staff, and vendors in mind, we have rescheduled several events. These are the affected events with the new dates:

• 3rd USENIX Workshop on Hot Topics in Edge Computing (HotEdge '20): July 14 at the Sheraton Boston in Boston, MA, USA, now co-located with USENIX ATC ’20
• 2020 USENIX Conference on Operational Machine Learning (OpML '20): July 30 at the Hyatt Regency Santa Clara in Santa Clara, CA, USA
• SREcon20 Asia/Pacific: September 7–9 at the Sheraton Grand Sydney Hyde Park in Sydney, Australia
• 2020 USENIX Conference on Privacy Engineering Practice and Respect (PEPR '20): October 15–16 at the Hyatt Regency Santa Clara in Santa Clara, CA, USA
• SREcon20 Americas: SREcon20 Americas West and SREcon20 Americas East have been combined into a single event taking place on December 7–9, 2020, at the Sheraton Boston in Boston, MA, USA

Additionally, we have cancelled LISA20; please save the dates for LISA21: June 1–3, 2021, Anaheim, CA, USA.

All of our other events scheduled after July 12, 2020, currently remain unchanged. USENIX Association is closely monitoring the Coronavirus (COVID-19) situation and will update this page as needed. We intend to continue following official guidance from public health officials.

Travel advisories are likely to continue evolving, and we recommend that conference participants monitor the information posted by the World Health Organization, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and regional authorities.

For those planning to attend our upcoming events (attendees, speakers, volunteers, staff, and vendors), we request that you follow the advice of the CDC, including these guidelines:

• Refraining from shaking hands at events and using non-contact forms of greeting instead (e.g., waving and/or greeting one another verbally)
• Observing personal space at events and avoiding close crowding
• Thorough and frequent hand washing, especially before eating and after blowing one’s nose, coughing, or sneezing
• Using an alcohol-based hand sanitizer with at least 60% alcohol
• Avoiding touching one’s face, especially with unwashed hands
• Using cough and sneeze etiquette (i.e., using and immediate disposal of tissues; if not possible, using the crook of one’s elbow)
• Avoiding close contact with people who are sick
• Self-isolating if experiencing cold or flu symptoms, including sending a substitute to the event in your place when possible

In addition to following the recommendations of health authorities, we are working with the venues that host our events to employ prudent precautions. Venues will provide hand sanitizing stations, as well as frequent wipe-downs of commonly touched areas, including door handles, counters, water dispensers, audio/visual equipment, etc.

USENIX maintains a list of local emergency care facilities in each city where we hold events, and asks that anyone experiencing symptoms of illness seek care as appropriate.

If you are a speaker who is unable to travel due to this situation, please contact the program co-chairs of your event to discuss arrangements.

You may contact USENIX with questions and concerns at conference@usenix.org.

Coronavirus/COVID-19 Resources
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Coronavirus Information
CDC Travel Advisory
World Health Organization (WHO) COVID-19 Situation Reports