Two Canadian hospitals were attacked by the cybercriminals this week. Connected by shared infrastructure, these two Southwestern Ontario hospitals currently suffering a cyber threat.
Earlier it was revealed that the healthcare industry has become the new favourites of the cybercriminals and this recent incident indicated why cybersecurity experts are worried about the digital security of hospitals.
As reported, the Listowel Wingham Hospitals Alliance, which supervises Listowel hospital and Wingham hospital, confirmed the cybersecurity news while stating that it is currently experiencing network issues as a result of what appears to be a cyber-attack.
The hospital president and CEO, Karl Ellis stated that the issues appeared on Wednesday night, September 25 and was detected during regular checking. He also mentioned that as soon as they detected the cyber threat the hospital authority took its networks offline. Meanwhile, the police and third-party tech experts started their work to determine the nature of the cybersecurity incident.
However, Ellis stated that they haven't found any evidence that shows patient records were compromised and the hospitals have not received a demand for payment which is common in ransomware attacks.
In addition, Ellis said that this cybersecurity issue is affecting both the hospitals as there is shared infrastructure between the two facilities.
An ethical hacker Dr Wesley McGrew, who leads the team at HORNE Cyber told IBTimes Singapore that in recent years, when it comes to cyber-attacks, ransomware is the current favourite technique, adopted by hackers, to steal data.
It should be noted that ransomware is a type of malicious computer program that denies access to the system or its data until a ransom is paid to the attacker. Only after paying the ransom the attacker provides a key or password that unlocks the data. But there is no surety that after making the payment hackers will return all the stolen data.
Recently, City of Woodstock, located in the Southwestern Ontario, Canada also facing a cyber-security threat that started on Saturday, September 21.
