A cyber attack hit part of New Zealand’s health service this week, and now hackers who claim to be behind the attack have made contact with health officials.
The attack brought down the Waikato District Health Board’s (DHB) complete IT network on Tuesday which resulted in some appointments being cancelled.
At Waikato hospital, 73 of 103 surgeries went ahead, although surgeries at one hospital have been postponed and all outpatient activity at rural hospitals have been deferred, the Waikato DHB said in an update.
Staff are currently trying to restore the infected systems and are working on the theory that the initial incursion was made via an email attachment.
The Waikato District Health Board chief executive Kevin Snee said investigators are still determining whether patient records had been lost or privacy breaches occurred, as reported by the New Zealand Herald.
Snee said the country’s National Cyber Security Centre is involved to guide the health organisation on how to respond to those claiming to be the hackers behind the attack.
"We've had a communication, but whether that is from the ... malicious actors or whether it is somebody else - we have to check the veracity of that," he said.
Snee added that he could not yet comment on the nature of the cyber attack, whether hackers had left hidden code inside the DHB’s network, or whether files remained locked or encrypted.
RELATED RESOURCE
The total economic impact of the Intel vPro® platform
Save costs. Save time. Save the workday.
Health officials also confirmed to the publication that the attack didn’t appear to be linked to the major ransomware assault on Ireland’s health network recently.
Last week, the Irish national health and social provider, the Health Service Executive (HSE), was forced to shut down its entire IT system following a ransomware attack. The shutdown was a precaution and led to outpatient medical appointments being postponed or cancelled. However, HSE chief executive Paul Reid said that thankfully the country’s vaccination programme hadn’t been affected by the cyber attack.
-
15-year-old revealed as key player in Scattered LAPSUS$ HuntersNews 'Rey' says he's trying to leave Scattered LAPSUS$ Hunters and is prepared to cooperate with law enforcement
-
The Scattered Lapsus$ Hunters group is targeting Zendesk customers – here’s what you need to knowNews The group appears to be infecting support and help-desk personnel with remote access trojans and other forms of malware
-
Impact of Asahi cyber attack laid bare as company confirms 1.5 million customers exposedNews No ransom has been paid, said president and group CEO Atsushi Katsuki, and the company is restoring its systems
-
The US, UK, and Australia just imposed sanctions on a Russian cyber crime group – 'we are exposing their dark networks and going after those responsible'News Media Land offers 'bulletproof' hosting services used for ransomware and DDoS attacks around the world
-
A notorious ransomware group is spreading fake Microsoft Teams ads to snare victimsNews The Rhysida ransomware group is leveraging Trusted Signing from Microsoft to lend plausibility to its activities
-
Volkswagen confirms security ‘incident’ amid ransomware breach claimsNews Volkswagen has confirmed a security "incident" has occurred, but insists no IT systems have been compromised.
-
The number of ransomware groups rockets as new, smaller players emergeNews The good news is that the number of victims remains steady
-
Teens arrested over nursery chain Kido hacknews The ransom attack caused widespread shock when the hackers published children's personal data
