The New York Times reports that clinical trials slowed down after healthcare software provider eResearchTechnology suffered ransomware attacks starting two weeks ago. IQVIA and Bristol Myers Squibb were two of the largest targets.
Both IQVIA and Bristol Myers Squibb said the effect of the attack was “limited,” thanks in part to data backups, but other eResearchTechnology customers apparently had to track trial patients using paper. It’s not clear if the malware affected any COVID-19 trials.
It’s not certain who’s behind the ransomware, and eResearchTechnology hasn’t said if it paid the ransom to get its computers back.
The incidents followed more than a thousand ransomware attacks on American cities, counties and hospitals over the past 18 months. The attacks, once treated as a nuisance, have taken on greater urgency in recent weeks as American officials worry they may interfere, directly or indirectly, with the November election.
A ransomware attack in Germany resulted in the first known death from a cyberattack in recent weeks, after Russian hackers seized 30 servers at University Hospital Düsseldorf, crashing systems and forcing the hospital to turn away emergency patients. As a result, the German authorities said, a woman in a life-threatening condition was sent to a hospital 20 miles away in Wuppertal and died from treatment delays.
More than a dozen countries have redeployed military and intelligence hackers to glean what they can about other nations’ responses, according to security researchers.
Even countries that previously did not stand out for their cyber prowess, like South Korea and Vietnam, have been named in recent security reports as countries that are engaged in hacking global health organizations in the pandemic.
