Article guidelines

SecureForge runs original, technical writing for people who work in security. The pieces that land cover threat intelligence, application and cloud security, detection engineering, GRC, physical-security convergence, and careers in the field. The single test every submission has to pass: does it teach a working practitioner something they can use?

We are not a news wire and we are not a vendor blog. Trend round-ups, product announcements, and “top 10 tools” listicles are declined on sight. Write the thing you wish someone had written before you had to learn it the hard way.

Submissions must be original, never published elsewhere, and at least 1,200 words of substance — depth, not padding. They must be well-structured, technically accurate, and free of obvious errors. Claims that matter should be supported: link the CVE, the advisory, the research, or the data.

We can tell. We read a lot of submissions, and machine-spun filler stands out immediately. AI is a fine drafting and editing assistant; it is not an author. If a piece reads like it was generated rather than lived, it's declined.

Some content is declined regardless of how well it's written:

• Operational attack instructionsaimed at causing harm — working exploit code or step-by-step intrusion guides against systems you don't own or aren't authorized to test.
• Undisclosed vulnerabilities. Anything covering a specific vulnerability must follow coordinated disclosure: the vendor fixed it, or an agreed disclosure window has passed.
• Doxxing or unmasking of individuals, and anything that puts a real person at risk.
• Thinly-veiled marketing — pieces whose real purpose is to sell a product or service.
• Plagiarism, fabricated research, or anything unlawful.

Defensive depth and responsible offensive research are welcome — weaponization is not. When in doubt, ask before you write.

Link generously to primary sources — advisories, research papers, RFCs, and the tools you reference. Those links help the reader and we keep them.

A short author bio with one link to your site, project, or profile is welcome and goes at the end. Beyond that, promotional or commercial links inside the body are removed, and submissions that exist mainly to carry a backlink are declined. We don't do link exchanges and we don't guarantee any link is followed.

Submitting to SecureForge is free, and it always will be. We don't charge for review and we don't charge for publication.

We also don't sell it. SecureForge does not accept sponsored posts, paid placements, or “guest posts” bought to plant a link. Every offer of payment for a placement is declined. Acceptance is based on one thing: whether the writing is good enough for our readers.

1. Pitch or draft.Send a finished draft, or a tight pitch (a paragraph on the angle and why you're the person to write it) through the submission form.
2. Human review. A real editor reads every submission. No automated rejections.
3. One round of edits.If we want it, we'll send light edits for clarity and house style. We don't rewrite your argument or change your conclusions without asking.
4. Publish. You get a byline, your bio, and a heads-up when it goes live so you can share it.

We aim to respond within 2–3 business days. If you haven't heard back in a week, it's fine to follow up once.

Be realistic about the odds. We decline far more than we run — most submissions are too thin, too promotional, or off-beat for our readers. A “no” isn't a judgment on you; it usually means the piece didn't clear the bar for this audience. Tighten it and pitch again.