In an academic environment, where innovation and openness are central, the risks from cyber threats are particularly high. Belgium's largest university, KU Leuven, has been proactively raising awareness and training its more than 15,000 staff members for years. With success, as the e-mune programme has become a strong brand at the university. GÉANT was curious about its approach and visited Sofie Pieraerd, a member of the management team for ICTS – KU Leuven's central IT department – and Karel Titeca, responsible for communications within ICTS.

From 1 January 2023, all institutions whose main activity is higher education and/or research will automatically become members of the Belnet R&E community.

October is just around the corner and, as usual, that means paying extra attention to information security. European Cybersecurity Month is THE opportunity to inform and raise awareness among your colleagues and end-users and turn them into true cyber heroes. Still looking for inspiration? If so, we'd like to explain two interesting initiatives to which we at Belnet are lending our active support.

For several years now, Belnet has been supporting the annual information security awareness campaign of the pan-European research network GÉANT. The 'human factor' is in fact a crucial element in the fight against security incidents. It is no different for research and educational institutions.

Since 2016, Belnet has been connecting the Federal Scientific Institutions (FSIs) with the internet and each other using the ScienceMAN network. One of the best known member organisations is undoubtedly the Royal Meteorological Institute (RMI).

From 1 January 2022, Belnet will take over the management of DMPonline.be from the DMPbelgium Consortium. This tool allows researchers to draw up, manage and share digital data management plans. Some twenty universities, colleges and research centres already use DMPonline.be.

Blockchain is the future. This technology is transforming our society. This is why the European Commission and the European Blockchain Partnership are building the European Blockchain Services Infrastructure (EBSI), striving for blockchain technology serving European citizens with services based on European values. The Early Adopters programme and multi-university pilot are showing how Europe's emerging Blockchain Infrastructure will look in practice. 

The Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB) called upon Belnet's expertise to host its podcast service 'EZcast'. We spoke to Michel Jansens and Fatima El Fakih from the SISC (Shared ICT Services Center of the ULB-VUB) about the successful collaboration.

Last month, Belnet was appointed as the mandated organisation of the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) Association for Belgium. The aim of EOSC is to create a new European web of data as a means of stimulating interdisciplinary research and thereby boosting science and the economy. Belnet's role within this ambitious project will be a coordinating and operational one.