null

Belgium 19-5-26 Invitation Only Physical english

AI vs AI in Cybersecurity: When defenders and attackers both use AI

The game has changed, clearly. Attackers have AI, defenders have AI, and both sides are learning faster than anyone expected, or maybe the attackers are just a bit faster. What used to take hours now happens in seconds, and detection windows close before alerts even appear. It’s adaptation beyond automation, and no one gets to sit still. But every promise of AI-driven defence comes with a price. The tools are expensive to train, maintain, and monitor. Mistakes cost more too. False positives drain teams, model drift hides real threats, and poisoned data turns protection into confusion. So now it’s not only about defending networks, it’s about defending the defenders themselves, from fatigue, blind trust, and automation gone wrong. So how do you keep visibility when both sides use the same weapons? How do you detect intent when patterns look human but aren’t? How do you justify cost when failure still happens, just faster? Let’s explore what happens when algorithms face each other on both sides of the firewall, and what new defences emerge when speed alone is no longer enough. A closed conversation about a future where cybersecurity becomes an AI vs AI battle, and humans still have to win.

Belgium 21-5-26 All Members Physical english

Replace, Wrap, or Rebuild? : Core modernization in financial services and insurance, without a full rewrite.

For banks, insurers, and other financial services leaders, core modernization is rarely a simple technology decision. The harder question is what to replace, what to wrap, what to rebuild selectively, and what to leave alone. This round table brings together senior peers to discuss how they are making those choices under real constraints: resilience, control, regulatory scrutiny, delivery speed, vendor dependency, and the risk of getting sequencing wrong. The conversation will focus on practical judgment, where modernization creates value, where it adds risk, and how to move forward without triggering another multi-year transformation cycle. A small-group discussion for leaders looking for clear decisions, credible trade-offs, and peer perspective.

Belgium 22-5-26 Invitation Only Physical english

Managing Vendor Lock-In: Balancing dependence, cost, and control in strategic partnerships

Every vendor swears their platform is open, flexible, and built for freedom. Then comes the renewal date. The price goes up, migration looks painful, and “strategic partnership” starts to feel more like dependency. Most organisations don’t get trapped overnight, they walk into it one contract at a time. Broadcom, anyone? We know lock-in isn’t only technical, it’s commercial, architectural, and even cultural. Once tools shape how teams work, switching becomes not only costly but politically impossible. So how do you manage dependency without losing leverage? What do you do when moving away costs more than staying? How do you negotiate from a position of weakness? And what governance models help prevent lock-in before it happens? Let’s share how to keep options open, make vendors compete without breaking partnerships, and find leverage even when it seems there’s none left. A closed conversation for those who’ve learned that freedom in IT is rarely free.

May 19, 2026 Squad Session Invitation Only Physical english

AI vs AI in Cybersecurity: When defenders and attackers both use AI

May 22, 2026 Squad Session Invitation Only Physical english

Managing Vendor Lock-In: Balancing dependence, cost, and control in strategic partnerships

May 26, 2026 Squad Session Invitation Only Virtual english

The Career Path of the Cloud Engineer: From system builder to strategic enabler of digital scale

The cloud engineer’s world keeps expanding. It started with provisioning and automation, but now it touches everything: resilience, security, cost, and even business continuity. What used to be a back-end function has become one of the most visible roles in digital operations. Yet with that visibility comes pressure: constant evolution, constant firefighting, and very little time to step back and ask, “Where is this career actually going?”

Please Log In with your CIONET account first

Decathlon expands global digital leadership and presence with a trusted partner

Decathlon, a leading sporting goods retailer with a vast global presence, has joined forces with Trend Micro to fortify its digital operations. As the company expands its online presence and embraces cutting-edge technologies, Trend Micro's comprehensive cybersecurity solutions are playing a vital role in protecting Decathlon's customers and data.

OVERVIEW

With more than 1,700 stores in 70 countries, global sporting goods retailer Decathlon aims to bring the power of sport to the world by designing the best products at the best prices, always innovating for quality, sustainability, and performance. Decathlon’s shift toward digital operations—including creating a top online platform for customers and embracing innovations—introduced multiple security challenges. The company partnered with Trend to ensure a streamlined security approach through Decathlon’s digital expansion.

Trend Micro offers us important security coverage, with solutions for the cloud, the internet of things (IoT), and so on. There are not a lot of companies that can help us across all of those parameters.

Matthieu Vanoost - Security Manager, Decathlon

CHALLENGES

Centralization and automation are at the heart of Decathlon’s cybersecurity strategy. The company needed its infrastructure to integrate and share data security internally. It also needed to create global security standards and implement them quickly in an fastpaced business environment. “Decathlon is focused on innovation. We want to become the top sporting goods platform, so the digital side of the company has to be innovative and keep pace with technology changes,” says Matthieu Vanoost, security manager at Decathlon.

In its digital expansion, Decathlon wanted to ensure that the company’s retail units used the same cybersecurity protocols as the rest of the company. It also needed to establish good governance to secure all applications and other assets, while ensuring compliance with domestic and international cybersecurity regulations.

WHY TREND

The Decathlon team was impressed with Trend’s versatile technology. And as the first vendor on the market offering extended detection and response (XDR) across email, network, server, and cloud workloads, Trend proved itself to be a multi-faceted partner that could meet Decathlon’s needs. “Trend offers us full security coverage from the cloud to endpoint devices and email. There are not a lot of companies that can help us across all of those parameters,” says Matthieu.

Matthieu and his team also found Trend to be a responsive partner, collaborating to solve problems and develop solutions in tandem. Trend readily accepted feedback and incorporated it into product updates, launches, and rollouts. “For me, the differentiator is the human touch, which is very important if you want to create a partnership. The human value is more important than the business,” says Matthieu.

For me the differentiator is the human touch, which is very important if you want to create a partnership. The human value is more important than the business.

Matthieu Vanoost Security Manager, Decathlon

SOLUTION

Trend’s solutions have allowed Decathlon to aggressively pursue its digital vision with confidence. Decathlon deployed Trend Vision One™, Trend Micro Apex One™ as a Service, Trend Micro™ Cloud App Security, Trend Cloud One™—Workload Security, and Trend Micro™ XDR.

In addition to offering Decathlon a cohesive view of risk across the organization and allowing the company to become better prepared to manage potential vulnerabilities, Trend’s solutions provide flexibility when it comes to cost. “Trend’s pricing method is great because there is no risk. If our cloud adoption increases, we pay more as you go. If adoption decreases, we pay less. This flexibility allows us to increase and contract when needed, giving us significant cost savings compared to older pricing models,” says Matthieu.

RESULTS

“We found Trend Vision One and Cloud App Security to secure our 100,000 Google users, easy to set up and deploy—which has been a major advantage,” says Matthieu. The company also benefited from Trend Vision One’s automatic collection of security incident data and how it collects information in one platform, reducing alert fatigue, saving time, and reducing costs. “The executive dashboards and risk insights help our security team present information to leadership and other stakeholders, as well as track progress made toward key performance indicators (KPIs),” says Matthieu.

Lastly, expanding to cover a new parameter can now be accomplished with ease—there is little to no manual management of technical set up required. “If you’re efficient—if you don’t need to get information from different platforms, you can activate a new perimeter with a click, and the data is sent directly through the platform—this is a big benefit,” Matthieu explains.

WHAT'S NEXT

Establishing Decathlon as a digital leader in the sporting goods market in Europe and around the world is the priority for the company in the next few years. This requires maintaining and improving security as parameters shift and threats continue to escalate online. It also means working with industry-leading partners like Trend to ensure that state-of-the-art solutions are continuously driving business growth and innovation.

Technologies

Apex One™ Cloud One – Workload Security Vision One™ with Managed XDR

Partners

CIONET Business Circles

Cyber Circle

CIONET’s Cyber Circle: a new three-event programme exclusively focusing on the most urgent, complex, and high-impact challenges in cybersecurity today. Launched in 2026, this initiative brings together CISOs, CIOs, and senior IT executives with a strong interest in cybersecurity for three curated gatherings each year. As part of CIONET’s trusted executive community, the Cyber Circle provides a confidential, peer-driven environment to exchange insights, share real-world experiences, and address evolving cyber threats. Each session is designed to foster strategic dialogue, strengthen resilience, and elevate cybersecurity as a core driver of business value.

Telenet Business Leadership Circle

The Telenet Business Leadership Circle powered by CIONET, offers a platform where IT executives and thought leaders can meet to inspire each other and share best practices. We want to be a facilitator who helps you optimise the performance of your IT function and your business by embracing the endless opportunities that digital change brings.

Les Rencontres

Découvrez la dynamique du leadership numérique aux Rencontres de CIONET, le programme francophone exclusif de CIONET pour les leaders numériques en Belgique, rendu possible grâce au soutien et à l'engagement de nos partenaires de programme : Deloitte, Denodo et Red Hat. Rejoignez trois événements inspirants par an à Liège, Namur et en Brabant Wallon, où des CIOs et des experts numériques francophones de premier plan partagent leurs perspectives et expériences sur des thèmes d'affaires et de IT actuels. Laissez-vous inspirer et apprenez des meilleurs du secteur lors de sessions captivantes conçues spécialement pour soutenir et enrichir votre rôle en tant que CIO pair. Ne manquez pas cette opportunité de faire partie d'un réseau exceptionnel d'innovateurs numériques !

Female Leadership Circle

CIONET is committed to highlighting and celebrating female role models in IT, Tech & Digital, creating a leadership programme that empowers and elevates women within the tech industry. This initiative is dedicated to showcasing the achievements and successes of leading women, fostering an environment where female role models are recognised, and their contributions can ignite progress and inspire the next generation of women in IT. Our mission is to shine the spotlight a little brighter on female role models in IT, Tech & Digital, and to empower each other through this inner network community.