The deployment of Cloudflare's 'Skipper' AI agent marks a turning point in autonomous network defense. By running on top of a unified analytics platform, Skipper can identify and mitigate complex, multi-vector attacks that would baffle traditional rule-based systems. However, this also signals the start of an 'AI vs. AI' era, where attackers will use their own agents to probe Skipper's logic for weaknesses. The critical challenge for 2026 will be ensuring the 'explainability' of AI defensive actions to prevent automated cascades of false positives that could disrupt legitimate global traffic.