Large-scale cyber attack disrupts healthcare provision

Synopsis

The UK’s public health system was put under considerable strain on 12th May 2017 when thousands of its computers were infected by the WannaCry ransomware virus.

Patient data was kept hostage and many hospitals were only accepting emergency cases. Non-emergency surgeries were halted as hackers locked staff out of their computers.

The cause of the hack was a vulnerability found on older Microsoft operating systems, there was a patch available but that had not been applied across the organisation.

In May 2018, it was reported that the NHS planned to spend £150 million to improve its defences against the “growing threat” of cyber attacks following the chaos caused by the WannaCry virus.

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Analyst

Courtenay Brammar

Experienced global enterprise risk and governance professional. Previously Vice President at Morgan Stanley, Deloitte Risk Advisory practitioner and PRMIA steering committee member in both London and New York.

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