Ireland's Health Service Systems Under Cybercrime Attack

[engine]

Ireland's health service systems are coming under attack, and it's believed to be a ransomware attack.

Mr Smyth, who is minister for public procurement and eGovernment, said it was an international attack.

He added: "These are cyber criminal gangs, looking for money.

"What they're attempting to do is to encrypt and lock away our data, and then to try to ransom it back to us for money."

The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has said the HSE became aware of a significant ransomware attack on some of its systems in the early hours of Friday morning and the NCSC was informed of the issue and immediately activated its crisis response plan.

Ireland's Health Minister Stephen Donnelly said the incident was having "a severe impact on [the] health and social care services".

[bbc.co.uk...]

Earlier story
Cyber attack shuts down largest pipeline in U.S. [webmasterworld.com]

[lammert]

I remember the time when cyber attacks were merely annoying. With the attacks more and more targeting critical infrastructure, it is now waiting for the first deaths caused by the attacks and murder charges issued to the hackers as a result. The pipeline ransom attack mentioned in the link above already triggered a massive governmental response.

[engine]

It seems the hackers relented and have provided a decryption key to the health service. [bbc.co.uk...]

[JorgeV]

Hello,

no idea why criminals gave it away.

"Fear" of having gone too far and the potential consequences.