There is a conversation happening in boardrooms across Malta right now. It usually starts with a question from the CEO or CFO: “Are we secure?” The CISO or Head of IT nods. Everyone moves on.
But what if the CEO and the CISO mean completely different things when they use the word “secure”? And what if that gap, invisible on the surface, is exactly where the risk lives?
The Speaker
This year’s keynote speaker at The Cybersecurity Imperative 2026 is Greg van der Gaast. At 16, he broke into a nuclear facility. He was caught, recruited by the FBI and Department of Defense as an undercover operative, and went on to spend 25 years advising Fortune 500 companies and global enterprises as a CISO and strategic security consultant. He has seen how organisations get attacked from the inside, and how they fail to defend themselves from the outside.
His argument is not a technical one. It is a business one: most organisations are not failing at cybersecurity because of a lack of tools or budget. They are failing because the people at the top and the people managing security are not having the same conversation. In that gap, risk grows undetected.
The Event
The Cybersecurity Imperative 2026, BMIT’s annual flagship cybersecurity conference, takes place on Wednesday 20th May 2026 at the Portomaso Suite, Hilton Malta. It is designed for business leaders who recognise that cybersecurity is no longer a question for the IT department alone, and who want to understand what genuine security leadership looks like at board level.
Why Now
Regulatory pressure on cybersecurity governance is tightening across sectors. Cyber insurance providers are raising their criteria. And as AI becomes embedded in business operations, the attack surface is expanding in ways that many leadership teams have yet to fully reckon with.
The question is no longer whether cybersecurity deserves a seat at the leadership table. It is whether the right conversation is actually happening there.
BMIT’s The Cybersecurity Imperative 2026 will be held on Wednesday 20th May 2026 Portomaso Suite, Hilton Malta from 08:00 to 14:00
Attendance is complimentary but places are strictly limited. Register here.
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