You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. Universal Health Services Inc., which operates more than 250 hospitals and other clinical facilities in the U.S., blamed the outage on an unspecified IT “security issue” in a statement posted to its website Monday but provided no details about the incident, such as how many facilities were affected and whether patients had to be diverted to other hospitals. Last week, a major supplier of software services to state, county and local governments, Tyler Technologies, was hit. Attackers like to attack the healthcare sector due to the potential value of such data. UHS may not be a household name, but has U.S. hospitals from Washington, D.C., to Fremont, California, and Orlando, Florida, to Anchorage, Alaska. Handing off a patient to another department, always a delicate task because of the potential for miscommunication, became especially nerve-wracking. Abusing Windows RDP servers to amplify DDoS attacks, Drupal fixed a new flaw related PEAR Archive_Tar library, Dovecat crypto-miner is targeting QNAP NAS devices, Passwords stolen via phishing campaign available through Google search, Experts warn of scanning activity for critical SAP SolMan flaw after the release of exploit, SolarWinds Attack: Microsoft sheds lights into Solorigate second-stage activation, REvil ransomware operators are recruiting new affiliates, Ransomware attack on Tyler Technologies might be worse than initially thought. January 22, 2021  UHS runs some 400 hospitals and care centers across the U.S. and the United Kingdom. This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. The King of Prussia-based hospital management company, which operates 354 behavioral health and acute care hospitals, was hit by a cyberattack on Sept. 27. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. The attack cyber-attack took place on Sunday morning, some patients have been redirected to other nearby hospitals because the UHS facilities were unable to operate. https://www.zdnet.com/article/uhs-hospital-network-hit-by-ransomware-attack Criminals have been increasingly targeting health care institutions with ransomware during the pandemic, infecting networks with malicious code that scrambles data. John Riggi, senior cybersecurity adviser to the American Hospital Association, called it a “suspected ransomware attack," affirming reporting on the social media site Reddit by people identifying themselves as UHS employees. The Fortune 500 corporation had annual revenues of $11.4 billion in 2019. Turn on desktop notifications for breaking stories about interest? 1. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. Statement from Universal Health Services Updated Thursday, October 29, 2020, 4:30 pm ET — As previously disclosed on September 29, 2020, we experienced an information technology security incident in the early morning hours of September 27, 2020. Universal Health Service (UHS), which is a Fortune 500 healthcare provider with over 90,000 employees, offers healthcare service to more than 3.5 million patients every year. Both the Texas and Washington D.C. workers asked not to be identified by name because they were not authorized to speak publicly. For more information or to change your cookie settings, click here. “Doctors aren’t able to access any type of X-rays, CT scans.”. ... 2020 Hyundai Tucson Review. CCHR calls for another UHS behavioral facility to be shut down. “We are most concerned with ransomware attacks which have the potential to disrupt patient care operations and risk patient safety," said Riggi, the cybersecurity adviser to hospitals. UHS Hospitals hit by Ryuk ransomware, forced to shut down systems | 2020-09-29 | Security Magazine The Ryuk ransomware operators were very active early this year, in March they targeted hospitals even as these organizations are involved in the fight against the Coronavirus pandemic. The healthcare sector is prone to paying the ransom because the disruption, lost productivity, and damage to the data can be more expansive than preventing the loss by paying the ransom. This wasn’t the first hospital cyber-attack on UHS. Telemetry monitors that show critical care patients' heart rates, blood pressure and oxygen levels went dark and had to be restored with ethernet cabling. “We believe any cyberattack against any hospital or health system is a threat-to-life crime and should be responded to and pursued as such by the government.”. Lab orders had to be hand-delivered. Computer systems across a major hospital chain operating in the U.S. and Britain were down Monday, Sept. 28, 2020, due to what the company termed an unspecified technology “security issue.” Universal Health Services Inc., which operates more than 400 hospitals and other clinical care facilities, said in a short statement p osted to its website Monday that its network was offline and doctors and nurses were resorting to “back-up processes” including paper records. Phone problems complicated the situation, making it harder to communicate with nurses. The only way to effectively recover, for those unwilling to pay ransoms, is through diligent daily system data backups. We have no access to our PACS radiology system.”. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant, File). UHS workers reached by The Associated Press at company facilities in Texas and Washington, D.C. described mad scrambles after the outage began overnight Sunday to render care, including longer emergency room waits and anxiety over determining which patients might be infected with the virus that causes COVID-19. The decision of the operators was not aligned with principal ransomware gangs that have announced they will no longer target health and medical organizations during the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. To unlock it, they demand payment. In September 2020, Universal Health Services a hospital and health care network with more than 400 facilities across the United States, Puerto Rico, and United Kingdom, found itself under attack by the Russian “Ryuk” ransomware. 24/7 coverage of breaking news and live events. Oct. 28, 2020. 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