Security leaders do not need another vendor pitch. They need peers who have handled the same incident, the same board conversation, the same buying decision. The CISO communities below split into free, sponsor-funded groups and paid memberships, with a few peer-led rooms in between.
Free to qualifying CISOs: Evanta CISO, The 403 Circle and the Open Future Forum CISO Roundtable. Paid membership or client access: Gartner C-level Communities, the CISO Executive Network and IANS Research.
| Community | Type | Access & cost | Focus | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Open Future Forum CISO Roundtable | Invite-only dinners and panels | Free to qualifying CISOs | AI governance, agentic security, board communication | Security leaders who want a small, candid room inside a cross-functional, AI-native C-suite community |
| Evanta CISO | Application-reviewed, sponsor-funded communities and summits | Free to qualifying CISOs | Enterprise security strategy, AI risk | CISOs at large organizations who want regional councils and summits |
| Gartner C-level Communities | Membership or Gartner client, vetted | Paid or client access | Vendor-neutral benchmarking, AI risk | CISOs who want global benchmarking and research backing |
| CISO Executive Network | Peer-to-peer membership organization | Paid membership | Best-practice sharing, executive gatherings | CISOs who want a structured national peer organization |
| The 403 Circle | Invite-only peer community | Free | CTO and CISO peer exchange, roundtables | Security and tech leaders who want an active peer group |
| CxO Security Forum | Community-led forum | Invite or qualified seats | AI, Zero Trust, risk, board communication | Senior security execs who want candid small-room discussion |
| IANS Research | Paid advisory and faculty network | Paid | Decision support, technical depth | CISOs who want on-demand expert guidance and benchmarking |
Costs and details reflect publicly available information in 2026 and change over time.
Most CISO communities are security only. The CISO Roundtable sits inside Open Future Forum, so security leaders share the room with the CFOs, CTOs and board members they work alongside.
The format favors small, off-the-record dinners and focused panels over large vendor floors, with the same giver standard that runs through Open Future Forum.
The agenda is AI security and governance. Past sessions have covered agentic security and the questions boards are asking, with practitioners like Caroline Wong in the room.
It depends on what a CISO wants. For a national peer organization, the CISO Executive Network. For sponsor-funded summits, Evanta CISO. For research-backed benchmarking, Gartner. For a small Silicon Valley room inside a cross-functional community, the Open Future Forum CISO Roundtable. See the full executive AI communities comparison for the wider field.
Evanta CISO, The 403 Circle and the Open Future Forum CISO Roundtable are free to qualifying leaders. Gartner C-level Communities, the CISO Executive Network and IANS Research run on paid membership or client access.
Those are security-focused, national or global. The CISO Roundtable is Silicon Valley, free to qualifying CISOs and set inside a cross-functional community, so CISOs meet finance, technology and board peers in the same room. It is AI-native.
Yes. It is the security vertical of Open Future Forum, a Silicon Valley executive community founded in 2019 that runs panel events and invite-only dinners for C-suite leaders.
The CISO Roundtable is invitation-only and free to qualifying CISOs. If you lead security in the AI era, or know a CISO who should be in the room, we would like to hear from you.