Three US Hospitals Hit by Ransomware

Staff Writer | BBC | February 23, 2016

The IT systems of three US hospitals have been infected with ransomware, which encrypts vital files and demands money to unlock them. The systems, at Kentucky Methodist Hospital, Chino Valley Medical Center and Desert Valley Hospital, California, are now running normally again. None of the hospitals is believed to have paid the ransom. And the cases are now being investigated by the FBI.

The Kentucky Methodist Hospital had to shut down all of its desktop computers and activate a back-up system. A message on its homepage said: "Methodist Hospital is currently working in an internal state of emergency due to a computer virus that has limited our use of electronic web-based services. We are currently working to resolve this issue, until then we will have limited access to web-based services and electronic communications." It later said no patient data or care had been affected.

Fred Ortega, a spokesman for Prime Healthcare Services, which owns Chino Valley Medical Center and Desert Valley Hospital, said: "It did cause significant disruptions of our IT systems. However, most of the systems and the critical infrastructure has been brought back online." The attack comes weeks after it was revealed Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Centre in Los Angeles had been attacked by ransomware...