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'Significant' Ransomware Attack Forces Ireland's Health Service To Shut Down IT Systems (therecord.media) 53

Posted by msmash from the how-about-that dept.
Catalin Cimpanu, reporting for Record: Ireland's national health service, the Health Service Executive (HSE), temporarily shut down its IT systems today after suffering a ransomware attack overnight. The organization, which is in the mid of its COVID-19 vaccination program, said the attack did not impact its ability to provide urgent medical care but that some routine checks and services might be delayed or canceled. The HSE described the ransomware incident as "significant" and "human-operated," a term used to describe high-end sophisticated ransomware groups which orchestrate targeted attacks against carefully big organizations. In a morning radio show with public broadcaster RTE, HSE Chief Executive Paul Reid said the agency's IT teams are currently investigating the incident to find out its breadth. In a different radio show, Reid identified the ransomware gang behind the attack as Conti, a ransomware gang that started operating in the summer of 2020.
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'Significant' Ransomware Attack Forces Ireland's Health Service To Shut Down IT Systems More

'Significant' Ransomware Attack Forces Ireland's Health Service To Shut Down IT Systems

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  • Another victim [slashdot.org] of DarkSide?

  • Everyone in ecology knows monocultures invite extinction. Why don't large governments - who have enough money to build their own operating systems, or at least tweak existing open source - know this and take commonsense measures? is government that ignorant of common sense -- or is this what lobbying does to the commons? And what was the vector? Was it attack from internet, bad software in the firewall, or another -- too easy -- stick USB in Windows machine for 30 seconds and it will autoexecute? More
    • It's not like using open source alternatives is more secure, if you go and create your own version of it, it's way more costly and you're just as vonerable as you have to keep up with at least all the security patches of the original. And Linux isn't as safe as you think, it's just as bugged as windows is. Also you might not have a choice as it also depends on what business software you need/are running. It's an utopia to have it all under your own control, but it's so expensive it's not feasible for about

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by thomst ( 1640045 )

      tanstaaf1 inquired:

      Why don't large governments - who have enough money to build their own operating systems, or at least tweak existing open source - know this and take commonsense measures?

      A major reason why governments (other than the PRC) don't roll their own OSes is because they can't afford to hire the top talent necessary to do so, due to caps on civil servants' salaries. And outsourcing the task to what we in the USA refer to as "Beltway bandits" is absolutely not a valid alternative to doing it in-house, both because those are money-extraction machines, not software development organizations, and because there's zero evidence that they could produce a hack-proof OS.

      I

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by jythie ( 914043 )
        and, at the end of the day, you would probably end up with something pretty similiar to other OSes. Linux, MacOS, WindowsXYZ, all represent a bit of convergent evolution based off user needs. Any government created OS that needed to meet all the same user requirements as other OSes would likely end up with all the same problems.

      • Every government that tried to roll its own OS, even if based on Linux, quickly became outdated and horribly insecure. That is the case in China, North Korea, Russia and even Germany.

        The problem is not monocultures, the problem is lack of funding for security initiatives across the board, the pipeline company was looking to hire Cybersecurity personnel until extra taxes and regulation set in, they quickly cut the first cost center they could find. Then they beat their chest for a while, get the government t

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by larwe ( 858929 )

      Why don't large governments - who have enough money to build their own operating systems, or at least tweak existing open source - know this and take commonsense measures?

      If you're positing that government should "protect" themselves by writing different operating systems or customizing existing ones - this is thinly disguised security through obscurity. The best use of resources (besides maintaining good opsec, which many governments and corporations do not) is to concentrate efforts on hardening existing OSes.

  • This sounds like ... (Score:5, Funny)

    by boudie2 ( 1134233 ) on Friday May 14, 2021 @11:01AM (#61384100)
    Another reason to get drunk.

  • I suspect we could see an unintended side effect from some of these attacks. We may well see the Nationalization of key pieces of infrastructure in the name of National Security. It could come piecemeal, Hospitals here, Electricity there, Gas pipelines, etc.. Or it could come under one umbrella: IT Security.

    • USC only IT jobs will be nice in the USA! With the big GOV paycheck + very hard to fire.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by whitroth ( 9367 )

        ROTFL!

        Yeah, right. I was working for a federal contractor (US), and was getting about the same pay and benefits as a fed did - I looked it up.

        Oh, and let's not forget that the "BIG GOV" paychecks are unlikely to be more than a Congresscritter gets, unlike private industry. No stock options, etc.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by jythie ( 914043 )
        I don't think people appreciate just how nerve wreaking unstable these jobs can be, esp in the US with its constant budget showdowns. Sure, they might not be able to fire you, but they also might stop paying you at any time. Departments are not allowed to have a warchest, so they are often operating month to month. Any time congress has a 'showdown', or upstream departments worry about their funds, payments can freeze up for weeks or months. They are also not required to actually abide by contracts, so
  • ...these people are going to pick on the wrong people and get cut into little pieces.

  • So long as the perception of benefits outweighs the perception of costs, this kind of thing will happen. Amateur, professional, or state-backed.

    Nations are going to have to start investing in changing the equation by legislating and funding the investigation of such attacks, and doling out serious punishments.

    • They cant. Too many countries welcome/support/tolerate/encourage such stuff cough cough china cough cough russia. And the hard truth is that its not worth starting a war with a major power over 10s of millions of dollars of misbehavior. The other option is to harden our computer systems. Except the even harder truth is that the cost of mitigating the problem is often more than just paying the occasional ransom. Life is complicated.
      • This. Bloomberg https://finance.yahoo.com/news... [yahoo.com] is reporting the 5 mil is barely a drop in the bucket of annual dividends of 1/2B to the colonial owners. And according to the report, they are acting like traditional slumlords. Minimal maintenance, maximal returns. Probably the only thing that would get colonial's attention is a 1 billion dollar fine for lack of security, and that is not going to happen.

  • I'm not sure what a "carefully big organization" is, but all you other carefully big organizations better tighten up your security!

  • Technical details? (Score:3)

    by hcs_$reboot ( 1536101 ) on Friday May 14, 2021 @12:46PM (#61384496)
    Many ransomware stories, but unfortunately few technical details. What is the vector of attack?
    • What are the targeted OSes?
    • Some tecky clues from a comment in https://gizmodo.com/ireland-sh... [gizmodo.com]

      oilchangesarecheap Matt Novak 5/14/21 8:55am Thanks Microsoft for making such shitty software that everyone is getting hacked. This doesn’t happen with Linux. Every windows PC was removed from the network and re-installed. I don’t get paid overtime. Its a large hospital chain unrelated to the one in this article. Fuck Microsoft and their shitty forced update system full of holes. Windows 7 boxes, running the information screens? Fine. Every linux box was unaffected. 1

  • Since most attacks are done with email why cant email be opened in a VM away from the main files?

    • why cant email be opened in a VM away from the main files?

      - in a what?

      a manager

    • Since most attacks are done with email why cant email be opened in a VM away from the main files?

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

      okay, lemme explain to you how the world works.

      First off, for a whole lot of people, their mailbox is their file system. Seriously, I've got guys with inbox trees six folders deep.

      Many of those e-mails have attachments, and those attachments need to get modified and sent back to the sender. Sure, it should be saved on a network folder, but I've got one client who has version hell issues because of terrible permissions settings they also insisted on implementing years ago.an

  • Negotiations for Ransom (Score:3)

    by Dartz-IRL ( 1640117 ) on Friday May 14, 2021 @01:34PM (#61384690)

    The HSE have apparently already initiated ransom negotiations. The Hackers have been informed that there is only a 3 year waiting list before a specialist consulting negotiatologist can see them.

    They can, of course, try get the ransom immediately if they go private.

    ---

    In non-humerous posts, I've heard the system was a bit like the Battlestar Galactica and might've been saved from worse damage because of it.

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