Technology is constantly evolving and so are cybercriminal tactics. Unfortunately, digitization and the adoption of new technologies and practices, especially cybersecurity related, are very slow processes in public institutions. This is quite worrying, especially in the case of healthcare organizations, where lots of private data and even human lives are at stake.
Nowadays, attackers are going after two primary objectives: disruption and data. First, attackers are looking to disrupt healthcare operations. Healthcare providers aren't like other businesses that can take their time if a system is compromised. If a hospital can't access its records or its ability to serve patients is compromised, that's a giant problem. While many attackers are chiefly concerned with disrupting services, some are going after the data in healthcare systems. In some breaches, attackers have taken the data first, and then deployed the ransomware into the organization. In such cases, attackers tell the healthcare organization to pay a ransom and they can get the data back, and if they don't pay, they'll detonate the ransomware and lock up their computer systems. Cybersecurity attacks aren't just costly to healthcare systems. They're hurting patient care.
There are some preventive steps that should take into consideration for healthcare organizations. For example: spend more budget on cybersecurity; training staff to make sure all employees understand the gravity of breaches to healthcare system; using two-factor authentication to access systems; replacing old system and technologies; hospital systems need to invest in defenses such as privileged access management tools to limit the ability of attackers to gain access to passwords or other sensitive data.
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