INTERPOL warns for Ransomware attacks on hospitals

INTERPOL’s Cybercrime Threat Response team has detected a significant increase in ransomware attacks against hospitals and medical services engaged in the virus response. The potential impact of such attacks have been revealed in the attack on Brno University Hospital based in Brno, Czech Republic in March. Highly placed sources say that the hospital was assigned the duty of investigating Coronavirus related blood samples coming from the whole of Central Europe. And due to cyber- attacks, the testing laboratory’s digital services have come to a grinding halt. All services related to surgeries were disrupted or re-routed to the emergency unit of St. Anne’s University Hospital.

The INTERPOL team is working closely with private partners in the cybersecurity industry to gather information and provide support to organizations targeted by ransomware. It’s assisting law enforcement with investigations into ransomware cases and analysis of cybercrime threat data to help them mitigate the risks, and member countries to help safeguard their critical medical infrastructure.

Additionally, INTERPOL is collecting a list of suspicious Internet domains related to COVID-19 and undertaking further analysis and evaluation, and will work with the relevant countries to take action. According to separate research carried out by CheckPoint, since Jan’2020 over 4000 domains were registered on a global note in the name of offering advice, services, info, and products related to Coronavirus. And out of them over 3% are deemed to be malevolent and 5% of them are described as suspicious.