Getting in for a few hundred dollarsĪdd to that the motivations of malicious actors who can buy their way into a network for a few hundred dollars, who are motivated by anything from espionage to ransom.īecause of existing weaknesses and unknown breaches, it is reasonable to assume that any network can be compromised and may in fact already be. As devices propagate and demands multiply it becomes harder to craft a network security strategy or to even train employees on security measures. Valuable clinical research data have been sought after by nation-states like China, who FireEye says have been aggressive in intellectual property intelligence against the American hospital and medical research world.Ĭancer research and medical device development are the two most hit targets, the firm found, although it noted that this may only be the spearhead of more incursions into confidential research and development data.Ĭybersecurity has long been acknowledged as a major weak area in healthcare. Clinical research dataįinancial gain through holding networks hostage isn’t the only goal of hackers, either. FireEye has documented numerous database sales for as low as $300 – all of which could serve as a launching pad for anything ranging from a phishing attack to a ransomware takeover of the institution’s network and data. Even more alarming, connected biomedical devices with life-critical functions are vulnerable with grave potential impact in a theoretical targeted attack.įor as little as a few thousand dollars, and sometimes even less, anyone on the dark web can have a database of compromised personal health information (PHI) from a hospital or health system. No data is fully safe: The report noted that clinical research will lure nation-states to underwrite major espionage actions. Because of the disparity between different organizations’ network strengths, hospitals with poorly secured networks are more frequent targets. Attacks can occur long after a breachĬompromised health information can be bought cheaply online and a malicious attack can occur long after any breach. A new study by the security firm FireEye examines how the healthcare industry is impacted by these threats and finds that there are key troves of information hackers are most likely to exploit.
Data can be held hostage through ransomware or can even be sought after by other nations as a means of espionage.ĭespite being uniquely appealing to thieves, hospitals are still struggling with security, and data still is exposed on a variety of fronts. Hospitals are a treasure trove of valuable information for a wide range of online actors.
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