VUB brings AI expertise to European cybersecurity project INCIDENTRON
Brussels, [25/02/2026] – Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) is contributing its artificial intelligence expertise to INCIDENTRON, a new European project that aims to simplify and strengthen cyber incident reporting across the European Union. The project brings together leading legal, technical and operational partners to help organisations comply with increasingly complex European cybersecurity regulations.
European organisations are facing a growing number of cyber incident reporting obligations under legislation such as NIS2, DORA, GDPR, CER and the Cyber Resilience Act (CRA). As a result, the incident reporting landscape has become highly fragmented. Multiple regulations impose overlapping but distinct reporting obligations, each with its own deadline, reporting content, format, and authorities to report to. One single incident may trigger numerous notifications across multiple frameworks, authorities and member states, and organisations struggle to manage these obligations efficiently and consistently.
INCIDENTRON addresses this challenge by developing an open source decision making framework, architecture and a platform that helps organisations determine when an incident must be reported, to whom, and what information is required. The goal is to reduce administrative burden while ensuring accurate, timely and legally compliant reporting across multiple regulations and jurisdictions.
Within the consortium, the VUB AI Lab contributes advanced artificial intelligence and data-driven methods to support decision-making in cyber incident reporting. These capabilities help structure incident information, support consistent interpretation of reporting criteria, and improve the reliability of data shared with competent authorities.
“Cyber incident reporting is no longer just a legal obligation; it is a complex operational challenge,” says Professor Johan Loeckx of the VUB AI Lab.
“By applying AI techniques, VUB helps transform fragmented regulatory requirements into structured, actionable insights that organisations can actually use under time pressure.”
By integrating AI into the INCIDENTRON framework, VUB supports the development of clear decision logic, standardized data structures and guided workflows. This enables organisations to respond more quickly and accurately, even when incidents affect multiple countries, sectors or reporting authorities.
Beyond the technical platform, the project also develops realistic incident scenarios and simulation-based exercises, aimed at IT- and cybersecurity professionals to help them better prevent, prepare for and respond to cybersecurity incidents.
By providing a shared European foundation for cyber incident notification, INCIDENTRON contributes to better situational awareness, more effective cross-border cooperation and a more aligned implementation of European cybersecurity legislation.
“INCIDENTRON shows how academic research, operational expertise and European collaboration can come together to address a very concrete societal and industrial need,” Professor Loeckx concludes.
INCIDENTRON.eu launch
The INCIDENTRON.eu project launches on 25th February at 2PM at the Cercle Royal Gaulois in Brussels Belgium. Registration is mandatory: INCIDENTRON Launch – Incident Reporting Automation Support
About the consortium and funding
The INCIDENTRON consortium is coordinated by LSEC – Leaders In Security (Belgium) and includes Timelex, ECSO, NOCODE-X, the VUB AI Lab, managed security service providers NRD Cyber Security, ITML and S2 Grupo, Member State CSIRTs CIRCL (Luxembourg) and INCIBE (Spain), and CDeX for cyber-range and training environments.
INCIDENTRON has been selected for funding by the European Commission under the Digital Europe Programme, within call DIGITAL-ECCC-2024-DEPLOY-CYBER-07-CYBERSEC-02. The project is supported through the European Cybersecurity Competence Centre (ECCC) and the National Coordination Centres (NCCs) under grant agreement 101249201.
About VUB
Vrije Universiteit Brussel is an internationally oriented research university in Brussels, with strong expertise in artificial intelligence, cybersecurity and applied digital innovation.
