The 2nd free5GC World Forum 2026

About the Forum

Call for Papers

We invite submissions to the 2nd free5GC World Forum. The forum welcomes original, unpublished papers addressing security, network architectures, system innovations, and real-world deployments of 5G/6G core networks, with particular emphasis on research, experimentation, and applications leveraging the free5GC platform.

Submission deadline: September 28, 2026

We are pleased to announce the 2nd free5GC World Forum, a premier forum bringing together researchers, industry professionals, open-source developers, and practitioners to explore the latest advances, challenges, and future directions in 5G/6G mobile networks and next-generation networked systems.

The forum focuses on the development, deployment, and evolution of open, programmable, secure, and intelligent mobile network infrastructures, with particular emphasis on 5G core networks, private mobile networks, cloud-native networking, network automation, and emerging AI-native network architectures.

free5GC (https://free5gc.org), a project hosted by the Linux Foundation, is a fully 3GPP-compliant open-source 5G Standalone (SA) core network platform. It provides researchers, developers, educators, and industry partners with a production-quality platform for designing, implementing, evaluating, and deploying next-generation mobile networking technologies. By enabling open experimentation and innovation, free5GC has become a global platform accelerating research, education, standardization, and commercialization in 5G and beyond.

Recent innovations built upon free5GC, such as L25GC+ (https://github.com/nycu-ucr/L25GC-plus), demonstrate how open-source mobile network platforms can enable the exploration of novel architectures, including significant reductions in control-plane latency while maintaining 3GPP compliance. Such efforts highlight the potential of open platforms to advance network performance, programmability, scalability, and security.

The forum provides a unique opportunity for participants to exchange ideas, present innovative research and real-world experiences, and shape the future development of open-source mobile networks and next-generation communication systems.

Topics of Interest

We invite original research papers, technical reports, and case studies in, but not limited to, the following areas:

Mobile Network Architectures and Systems

5G Standalone (SA) core networks and next-generation cellular architectures
Open-source 5G/6G core network platforms, including free5GC development and enhancements
Low-latency and high-performance mobile core architectures (e.g., L25GC+)
Network Function Virtualization (NFV), cloud-native networking, and container-based mobile systems
Network slicing, virtualization, and programmable network infrastructures
Edge computing, Multi-access Edge Computing (MEC), and distributed mobile systems
AI-native networking, intelligent orchestration, and automated network management
6G visions, architectures, and future mobile core networks

5G/6G Network Security, Privacy, and Trust

Security and privacy challenges in 5G/6G core networks
Threat modeling, vulnerability analysis, and attack detection for open-source mobile networks
Secure network slicing, isolation, and resource management
Authentication, authorization, identity management, and access control in 5G/6G systems
Zero-trust architectures for next-generation mobile networks
AI/ML approaches for security monitoring, anomaly detection, and threat mitigation
Denial-of-Service (DoS) detection and mitigation in mobile core networks
End-to-end security and resilience in 5G and beyond
Post-quantum cryptography and future security mechanisms for mobile networks
Security and interoperability between 5G/6G and legacy networks
Digital forensics, incident response, and security operations for mobile infrastructures

Network Performance, Deployment, and Ecosystem Innovation

Network measurement, performance evaluation, and optimization
Interoperability, multi-vendor integration, and open networking ecosystems
Experimental platforms, testbeds, and large-scale mobile network evaluations
Private cellular networks and industrial 5G deployments
Multi-operator network scenarios and advanced mobile service architectures
Real-world deployments, operational experiences, and case studies using free5GC
Integration of open-source projects and applications with free5GC
Standardization efforts and industry collaboration for future mobile networks

Submissions will be evaluated based on technical quality, originality, practical impact, and relevance to next-generation mobile and networked systems. We particularly encourage contributions demonstrating innovative architectures, experimental results, open-source implementations, security analysis, performance improvements, or practical deployment experiences using free5GC and related platforms.

Submission Guidelines

Submitted papers must not substantially overlap papers that have been published or that are simultaneously submitted to a journal or a conference with proceedings.
Long papers: Maximum 12 pages for review, with the final camera-ready version limited to 9 pages. Submissions should be no more than 12 pages in the ACM double-column format, excluding the bibliography and well-marked appendix. Committee members are not required to read the appendices, so the paper should be understandable without them. For accepted papers, the final camera-ready version may be limited to 9 pages, including the bibliography, appendix, and all content.
Short papers: 4 pages for both review and final camera-ready submission. The forum also welcomes short submissions of up to 4 pages for preliminary results or concise contributions that can be clearly described in a few pages.
Authors of long-paper submissions may indicate in a footnote on the first page if they would like their paper to also be considered for publication as a short paper (4 pages in the proceedings).
Submissions must be PDF files in the ACM double-column format (https://www.acm.org/publications/proceedings-template) using the “sigconf” template. Authors should not modify the font or margins of the ACM format. The CCS information such as concepts, keywords, or rights management data (e.g., DOI, ISBN) must be included. A teaser figure is optional. Please refer to sample-sigconf.tex and sample-sigconf.pdf in the ACM LaTeX package (https://www.overleaf.com/latex/templates/association-for-computing-machinery-acm-sig-proceedings-template/bmvfhcdnxfty) for formatting examples. Submissions not following the required format may be rejected without review.
Submissions should not be anonymized.
The submission website will be announced soon. Only PDF files will be accepted. Submissions that do not comply with these guidelines may be rejected without review.
Authors of accepted papers must ensure that their paper will be presented at the forum by at least one of the authors.

Note

Authors of accepted papers are required to ensure that their papers are presented at the forum.

Important Dates

Paper Submission Deadline

September 28, 2026

Notification of Acceptance

October 28, 2026

Camera-Ready Papers Due

November 10, 2026

Forum Date

December 17-18, 2026

Venue

The 2nd free5GC World Forum will take place at National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU) in Hsinchu, Taiwan, providing opportunities for in-depth discussions and collaboration on 5G core networks.

Organizing Committee

General Chairs

Jyh-Cheng Chen

National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU)

K. K. Ramakrishnan

University of California, Riverside

General Vice Chair

Chi-Yu Li

National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU)

International Advisory Committee

Falko Dressler

TU Berlin

Tommaso Melodia

Northeastern University

Akihiro Nakao

The University of Tokyo

Shivendra Panwar

Tandon School of Engineering of New York University

Ashutosh Sabharwal

Rice University

Technical Program Committee Chair

Chien Chen

National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU)

Publicity Chairs

Chi-Yu Li

National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU)

Shixiong Qi

Southeast University

Web Chair

Feng Tu

Saviah Technologies, Inc.

Program Committee Members (To Be Finalized)

Chien Chen, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU)

Nakjung Choi, Nokia Bell Labs

Rahman Doost-Mohammady, Rice University

Yuki Koizumi, Osaka University

Xinyu Lei, Michigan Technological University

Chi-Yu Li, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU)

Fuchun Joseph Lin, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU)

Chunyi Peng, Purdue University

Shixiong Qi, Southeast University

Edwin Ren, University of East Anglia

Yuji Sekiya, The University of Tokyo

Ivan Seskar, Rutgers University

Junji Takemasa, Osaka University

Zhaowei Tan, University of California, Riverside

Chien-Chao Tseng, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU)

Feng Tu, Saviah Technologies, Inc.

Guan-Hua Tu, Michigan State University

Hiroki Watanabe, SoftBank Corp.

Yang Xiao, University of Kentucky

Tian Xie, Utah State University

Li-Hsing Yen, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU)

Antonia Zhai, University of Minnesota

Zhi-Li Zhang, University of Minnesota