Of the main healthcare headlines this 12 months, a few of the most notable highlighted the escalation of cyberattacks and information breaches.
Cyberattacks in healthcare can have massive penalties: They’re each life threatening to sufferers and might price hundreds of thousands of {dollars}. Cybercriminals, who exploit the sector’s lagging know-how programs, can maintain useful affected person info for ransom, whereas well being organizations are pressured to both pay the worth or watch as affected person information is auctioned off on the darkish internet.
As cyberattacks rose this 12 months, no occasion dominated headlines just like the ransomware assault at UnitedHealth-owned Change Healthcare. The cyberattack crippled essential funds from insurers to suppliers for weeks and impacted 100 million Individuals. The scope of the assault prompted federal regulators to open an investigation into Change, and United Well being CEO Andrew Witty was pressured to testify earlier than Congress in regards to the firm’s safety measures.
However whereas Change was the most important incident, a number of different breaches and cyberattacks impacted healthcare operations throughout the nation.Â
A ransomware assault at Ascension, one of many largest nonprofit well being programs within the nation, took the system’s digital well being file offline, prompted some hospitals to divert ambulances and impacted scientific operations in 11 states and Washington, D.C. Ascension executives mentioned the assault contributed to its $1.1 billion internet loss throughout its 2024 fiscal 12 months.
Assaults additionally impacted smaller amenities, together with at a Chicago kids’s hospital, a Michigan-based supplier and a Colorado system.
Whereas some hospitals handled ransomware assaults, different organizations needed to deal with each assaults and information breaches. Information breaches after cyberattacks are additionally on the rise. Breaches at a contractor for the CMS and advantages administrator HealthEquity uncovered the non-public well being info from over 900,000 individuals and 4.3 million members, respectively. Final 12 months, 141% extra massive information breaches have been reported to regulators in comparison with 2022.
As we head into 2025, beneath are seven of the most important cyberattack and information breach tales in healthcare this 12 months, together with some you might have missed.
