Some companies sell to consumers. Others provide the technology and services that other businesses need to operate: banking and retail systems, property management software, payment processing, food supplies, and industrial technology. When a business like that has a security problem, its customers feel it too. That raises a clear question: what does cybersecurity leadership involve when customers depend on your organization’s technology and services? The five leaders below took on new security mandates in 2026 at companies in exactly that position.
Christopher Crites – CISO, Diebold Nixdorf
Christopher Crites spent four years running Diebold Nixdorf’s security operations and incident response before becoming the company’s CISO. He took on the role on an interim basis in February 2026 and was named CISO in August, leading global cybersecurity strategy for a company serving the banking and retail industries. His remit spans enterprise and product security, security operations, identity and access management, application and cloud security, third-party risk, and governance, and he works with the executive team and board to turn cyber risk into clear priorities. His background is in operations under pressure. Over eight years at the Defense Information Systems Agency, he led a security operations team of around 50 and briefed officials across the Department of Homeland Security, the NSA, and the FBI on high-profile investigations, while serving for 13 years as an Air Force reservist working on command and control communications systems. He holds a master’s in technology leadership from Brown University.
Matias Blanco – CISO, Entrata
Matias Blanco started out writing exploits. At Core Security in Buenos Aires, he developed web and binary exploits for widely used applications and led the company’s exploit writing team, including a mobile devices exploit team for Black Hat in 2011. He went on to penetration testing at IOActive and Okta, where over nearly 11 years he rose from senior penetration testing engineer to senior director of product security, unifying security across Okta’s and Auth0’s platforms, and for a time led its product, offensive, and infrastructure security work. In July 2026 he became CISO of Entrata, the property management software company, bringing a product security perspective to software its customers use to run their operations. He also serves on the board of Hack the Hood, a nonprofit in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Dino Dai Zovi – SVP, Head of Security, Adyen
Dino Dai Zovi’s work at Square inspired a payment industry security standard. As the company’s first staff security engineer, he led security for its EMV launch and international payments expansion into Australia, the UK, and Canada, and led development of the mobile anti-tamper technology that let buyers enter PINs on a seller’s mobile device, which inspired the PCI Software-based PIN Entry on COTS standard. At Block, he built Cash App’s security organization from a team of one into five specialized engineering teams, then led applied security engineering across areas including payment card acceptance, hardware devices, and cryptographic implementation. In June 2026 he joined payments company Adyen as SVP and head of security. He is also known in the security community for winning the first Pwn2Own contest in 2007, co-authoring The iOS Hacker’s Handbook, and co-founding Trail of Bits, Capsule8, and the Pwnie Awards.
Nick Birjmohun – CISO, Sligro Food Group
Nick Birjmohun describes technology as the engine behind Sligro Food Group’s digital and logistics processes, which thousands of hospitality, catering, and retail businesses rely on every day for food and non-food products. As CISO since May 2026, he is responsible for information security, cyber resilience, and IT risk management at the foodservice and food retail wholesaler in the Netherlands and Belgium, with a focus on pragmatic security that supports the business and lets it grow safely. He arrived after more than nine years as CISO of Renewi, the waste and recycling company formed in 2017 from the merger of Van Gansewinkel and Shanks, with around 7,000 employees and 150 processing sites, where he was responsible for protecting data and strengthening cyber and operational resilience. Before that, he managed compliance and information security at Van Gansewinkel, after starting his career in IT audit at EY.
Johan Boije af Gennäs – CISO, Valmet
At KONE, Johan Boije af Gennäs was responsible for security across enterprise IT, industrial systems, and the products themselves. Over seven years as CISO, he built a customer-focused cybersecurity team centered on meeting customer and regulatory requirements, building a culture where everyone contributes to security, and making sure products and services were designed to be resilient. He then spent nearly three years as VP of cybersecurity and CISO at Veikkaus, focusing on software and cloud security and digital resilience. In September 2026 he became CISO of industrial technology company Valmet, leading information and cybersecurity strategy across the group. His career began in security consulting at HP, followed by a decade at Nokia, where he helped build its internal security incident response function and later led security and operational excellence through the company’s transition to Microsoft.
Five Answers to the Same Question
Each of these leaders brings a different answer to what security means when customers depend on you. For Crites, it starts with incident response. For Blanco and Dai Zovi, it runs through the security of the products themselves, and in Dai Zovi’s case, through the standards the industry adopts. Birjmohun focuses on resilience that keeps supply flowing, and Boije af Gennäs on building security around customer and regulatory requirements. All five are now applying that experience in their seats.
Discover more CISOs securing their organizations:
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- Running It and Securing It: The Cyber Leaders Who Own Both Infrastructure and Security
- Security in Motion: The European CISOs Helping Businesses Transform
- From Policy to Practice: Europe’s Cyber Leaders Securing AI Adoption
- Everyday Services, Secured: The Adriatic and Western Balkans CISOs to Watch
- One Strategy, Many Flags: Europe’s Cyber Leaders Securing Across Borders and Brands
John Kevin Hao is a news and feature writer covering cybersecurity, technology, and business targeted for professional audiences.