After a short hiatus, BlueHat is coming back with a vengeance! And we’ve got big plans for the entire researcher community.

But first, I must apologize. It’s been a while since you have heard from us. We didn’t have BlueHat 2020 or 2021, and we know that was disappointing. It was partly due to the pandemic, where our priority was simply keeping everyone safe. It was also partly due to screen fatigue, since we’d been hearing a lot of complaints about all-day virtual events, especially ones with lots of pre-recorded elements. But really, it’s on us. Again, we’re so sorry we left you high and dry, and we’d like to start making it up to you. Without BlueHat and other conferences you haven’t had as many opportunities to engage with each other or MSRC. We want to change that immediately.

First, we have a LIVE virtual panel taking place next week on Wednesday, November 17 at 9am PST. MSRC’s VP Aanchal Gupta ( @nchlgpt ) along with Jarek Stanley ( @ja_wreck ) & Vishal Chauhan ( @axsdnied ) will be joined by three incredible external researchers, Dr. Nestori Syynimaa ( @DrAzureAD ), Nate Warfield ( @n0x08 ), and Boris Larin ( @oct0xor ), all to reinvigorate the conversation. Register at https://aka.ms/MSRC-Registration.

And that’s just the beginning. You can expect opportunities to engage with the BlueHat community and MSRC once a month. We want to include researcher spotlights and sessions, and if you’re a researcher who’s interested in presenting at one of these events, we want to hear your idea! All of this is a means to build back up our support of the researchers, give you a place and a platform to hear, exchange, and present ideas. We have big plans for next year - stay on top of everything at www.microsoft.com/bluehat or connect with us on Twitter at @MSFTBlueHat and @BlueHatIL. And you can always drop us a line at [email protected].

The bottom line is this: We missed you a lot, we let you down, but now we want to rebuild with utmost transparency. We promise to make it up to you! Because believe it or not, we love you, and what you do not only secures precious customer data, it protects the world. And we’re not sorry for being melodramatic about it.