Ransomware attack on Irish health service
May 21, 2021 4:25 AM Subscribe
The Irish Health Service Executive (HSE) was hit by a major ransomware attack last week.
Systems are slowly coming back online but hospitals and health services across the country have been heavily impacted with many running in major emergency mode and without access to patient files and records. Blood testing is effectively shut down. [Irish Times, soft paywall]
Some of the stolen data appears to already have been posted online. The group responsible have provided a decryption key to the Irish government but say they will release the data they have stolen online and sell to criminal groups if a ransom is not payed by Monday. Irish government policy is to not pay ransoms to cyber criminals.
Systems are slowly coming back online but hospitals and health services across the country have been heavily impacted with many running in major emergency mode and without access to patient files and records. Blood testing is effectively shut down. [Irish Times, soft paywall]
Some of the stolen data appears to already have been posted online. The group responsible have provided a decryption key to the Irish government but say they will release the data they have stolen online and sell to criminal groups if a ransom is not payed by Monday. Irish government policy is to not pay ransoms to cyber criminals.
Health services have got to be pretty bad in Ireland if U.S. providers can make plausible offers to beat them. Is it a trainwreck over there too, or is it just a matter of having to wait for availability?
posted by spacewrench at 6:37 AM on May 21, 2021
posted by spacewrench at 6:37 AM on May 21, 2021
@spacewrench In general I would say quality is world class but we have a strange hybrid public\private system. If you have non-mandatory private cover then procedures are covered more or less.
For example my eldest son needed cruciate surgery on his knee from a sport injury this year, we paid an excess fee of EUR 200 for the procedure as we have private healthcare through my job. We still have to pay EUR 60 or so to visit a normal family doctor.
If you were unemployed or otherwise disadvantaged you would qualify for a medical card. This entitles you to free doctor appointments, free medication and free care in the public hospital system. These are often the same hospitals as above. The problem with this is that waiting lists can be long.
posted by GallonOfAlan at 6:51 AM on May 21, 2021 [4 favorites]
For example my eldest son needed cruciate surgery on his knee from a sport injury this year, we paid an excess fee of EUR 200 for the procedure as we have private healthcare through my job. We still have to pay EUR 60 or so to visit a normal family doctor.
If you were unemployed or otherwise disadvantaged you would qualify for a medical card. This entitles you to free doctor appointments, free medication and free care in the public hospital system. These are often the same hospitals as above. The problem with this is that waiting lists can be long.
posted by GallonOfAlan at 6:51 AM on May 21, 2021 [4 favorites]
Health services have got to be pretty bad in Ireland
It's not great, but it's a different problem to what you have in the US. The main problem is availability - there are long waiting lists for any non-emergency procedures, and hospitals tend to be running at higher occupancy than they should be, so that particularly in winter it's fairly usual to have large numbers of people waiting on trolleys for a bed to become available.
Added to the mix is that it is a two tier system, so that those with private health insurance (about 40% of the population according to wikipedia) can basically skip the queue. However, you don't normally have to worry too much about the financial side of things (nothing like to the extent as in the US, anyway).
posted by scorbet at 6:52 AM on May 21, 2021 [5 favorites]
It's not great, but it's a different problem to what you have in the US. The main problem is availability - there are long waiting lists for any non-emergency procedures, and hospitals tend to be running at higher occupancy than they should be, so that particularly in winter it's fairly usual to have large numbers of people waiting on trolleys for a bed to become available.
Added to the mix is that it is a two tier system, so that those with private health insurance (about 40% of the population according to wikipedia) can basically skip the queue. However, you don't normally have to worry too much about the financial side of things (nothing like to the extent as in the US, anyway).
posted by scorbet at 6:52 AM on May 21, 2021 [5 favorites]
Daragh Ó Briain (not the comedian) had a twitter thread yesterday suggesting how anyone potentially affected by this should try and approach it. In particular, to be careful about potential scammers, and to try and warn people who might not realise the consequences of this happening.
posted by scorbet at 6:58 AM on May 21, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by scorbet at 6:58 AM on May 21, 2021 [1 favorite]
Irish health service doesn't need cyber-hoods to compromise patient data. Children’s Health Ireland (CHI) shipped 1,500 genetic patient data records to Genomics Medicine Ireland (now Genuity Inc.) in 2019 without patient consent.
scorbet says 40% have private health insurance. That would be me (paying €1,000/yr). 30% have the medical card which has no costs but crazy long wait times. Which leaves 30% who cannot scrabble together €1,000 but are "too rich" to be eligible for the medical card. As GallonOfAlan notes, the charges [€100 for A&E visit or others here itemised] are nothing like those found in the USA.
posted by BobTheScientist at 7:16 AM on May 21, 2021 [6 favorites]
scorbet says 40% have private health insurance. That would be me (paying €1,000/yr). 30% have the medical card which has no costs but crazy long wait times. Which leaves 30% who cannot scrabble together €1,000 but are "too rich" to be eligible for the medical card. As GallonOfAlan notes, the charges [€100 for A&E visit or others here itemised] are nothing like those found in the USA.
posted by BobTheScientist at 7:16 AM on May 21, 2021 [6 favorites]
The HSE has a solid history of massive and deadly screw ups (the cervical cancer one being the most recent of the massive and deadly ones), so the fact that this happened is sort of par for the course in one way.
Public health care is available but the waiting lists are such that you will suffer horrifically sometimes while waiting for treatment for years. With this on top of Covid, post Covid healthcare in Ireland for many is not going to be good.
posted by lesbiassparrow at 7:16 AM on May 21, 2021
Public health care is available but the waiting lists are such that you will suffer horrifically sometimes while waiting for treatment for years. With this on top of Covid, post Covid healthcare in Ireland for many is not going to be good.
posted by lesbiassparrow at 7:16 AM on May 21, 2021
And meanwhile, some fucking children (whatever age they are) think it's fine and funny to harm this many human lives. Disgusting.
posted by PhineasGage at 7:56 AM on May 21, 2021 [5 favorites]
posted by PhineasGage at 7:56 AM on May 21, 2021 [5 favorites]
The gift of bitcoin just keeps right on giving.
posted by Static Vagabond at 8:30 AM on May 21, 2021 [9 favorites]
posted by Static Vagabond at 8:30 AM on May 21, 2021 [9 favorites]
Even with the ecological damage and all the other problems, I'm honestly surprised that the exchange of cryptocurrency isn't being treated as the deadly serious national security threat that it is, underwriting attacks on healthcare and energy systems being two notable current examples. It seems like it would be much much harder to get away with holding people's lives at ransom, when real (and traceable) money has to be used.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 9:52 AM on May 21, 2021 [9 favorites]
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 9:52 AM on May 21, 2021 [9 favorites]
This the result of an effectively anonymous global money laundering engine that can easily, quickly, and safely move many millions of dollars. Right now it's all about drugs and ransoms. I assume terrorism and kidnappings and assassination markets are on the way.
posted by ryanrs at 11:24 AM on May 21, 2021 [7 favorites]
posted by ryanrs at 11:24 AM on May 21, 2021 [7 favorites]
The combination for your traditional special executive is counterintelligence, terrorism, revenge, and extortion.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 12:14 PM on May 21, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by Huffy Puffy at 12:14 PM on May 21, 2021 [1 favorite]
Stephen Diehl, "The Oncoming Storm":
Imagine a hundred new Stuxnet-level exploits every day, for every piece of a equipment in public works and health care. Where every day your check your phone for the level of ransomware in the wild just like you do the weather. Entire cities randomly have their metro systems, water, power grids and internet shut off and on like a sudden onset of bad cybersecurity “weather”.posted by Iridic at 7:37 PM on May 21, 2021 [5 favorites]
Or a time in business in which every company simply just allocates a portion of its earnings upfront every quarter and pre-pays off large ransomware groups in advance. It’s just a universal cost of doing business and one that is fully sanctioned by the government because we’ve all just given up trying to prevent it and it’s more efficient just to pay the protection racket.
Imagine a world in which every other month you’re forced to bid for your personal data back from hackers who continuously rob you. And a world where all of this is is so commonplace there are automated darknet marketplaces where others can bid on your data, and every detail of your personal life is up for sale to the highest bidder. Every private text, photo, email, and password is just a digital commodity to be traded on the market. Because that’s what the market demands and that’s what capitalism left unchecked will provide.
@Iridic This is why the Internet Of Things is an incredibly stupid idea. We can't even keep the stuff that it makes sense to have online secure. Why are we connecting cars and fridges to it ?
posted by GallonOfAlan at 6:43 AM on May 24, 2021
posted by GallonOfAlan at 6:43 AM on May 24, 2021
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People have already been cold-called by US entities offering them surgical procedures that they require, so that's bullshit.
posted by GallonOfAlan at 6:11 AM on May 21, 2021 [2 favorites]