Another hospital victim of a severe computer intrusion! This time, it is a Spanish care establishment which is affected, the Hospital Clínic Barcelona. This Friday, the Catalan public authorities have just revealed the amount of the ransom demanded by the cybercriminals of Ransom House at the public hospital. It stands at 4.5 million dollars (4.25 million euros).
🔴The secretary of #Telecommunications i #DigitalTransformation, @sergimarcenal @maticatradio about the cyber attack a @hospitalclinic:
“They’re Ransom House. We haven’t paid and won’t pay a cent.” pic.twitter.com/FvLieMl48M— Adm. gencat digital (@gencatdigital) March 9, 2023
The university hospital has been facing a major hack since Sunday morning that targeted its virtual machines and resulted in a data leak. There cyberattackdescribed as “sophisticated and complex” and having implemented “new techniques”, forced the authorities to redirect emergencies to other hospitals in Barcelona, then to suspend external consultations and non-emergency operations while the teams of the care facility were down to paper and pen.
Very gradual recovery
In his last point position Thursday evening, the Catalan healthcare establishment noted that half of the outpatient consultations had been able to resume, as well as all of the scheduled surgeries at headquarters. If the maternity ward has also taken over the monitoring of pregnancies, the ophthalmology service is only working at 75% of its capacity.
“The resumption of activity will be very gradual”, warned the Catalan cybersecurity agency. Last countonly 15% of the hospital’s IT systems were working.
Beyond concerns about the dissemination of confidential information relating to the treatment of patients, the Catalan daily The newspaper is also concerned about possible theft of clinical research data. As the newspaper reminds us, data from work carried out to fight cancer and autoimmune diseases could have value on the black markets. Local authorities, however, did not specify the nature of the stolen data.
Specialized in data theft
First spotted at last spring, Ransom House cybercriminals, active since at least December 2021, say they are focused on stealing and reselling data. Thus, in case of non-payment of the demanded ransom, cybercriminals sell the stolen data to the highest bidder. If for the moment they have not pinned a French organization to their hunting board, they have just claimed at the beginning of March the hacking of an Italian hospital or a trading platform in Dubai.
The judicial investigation was entrusted to the Mossos d’Esquadra, the local police, assisted by Interpol and Europol. In France, in recent months, several hospitals had also borne the brunt of computer attacks. At the end of September, the Corbeil-Essonnes hospital, severely affected, had estimated the bill at a total of 7 million euros.
