Hospitals’ COVID-19 Responses Slowed Due to Major Cyberattack

COVID-19 testing has reportedly been slowed due to a major cyberattack that forced Montreal hospitals to go off-line. An Oct. 28 cyberattack threatened hundreds of thousands of Canadians’ personal health data and left many waiting up to a week for COVID-19 test results.

Montreal Health Centres Targeted in Cyberattack

Montreal’s Jewish General Hospital, the head office of the CIUSSS in the Centre-Ouest-de-l’Île-de-Montréal, has disconnected from the Internet after a cyberattack. The CIUSSS operates the 811 call center.

The area covered by the Centre-Ouest-de-l’Île-de-Montréal network is home to approximately 345,000 people. The area also comprises 30 member facilities, including one of Montreal’s leading hospitals, the Jewish General Hospital, three specialized hospitals, five CLSCs, two rehabilitation centres, six long-term care sites and more.

The Oct. 28 attack coincided with a large coordinated hacker offensive against several hospitals across the United States. The criminals reportedly used the Russian-designed Ryuk ransom software, according to a joint note from cyber security authorities, the FBI and the Department of Health.

CBC reports that personal information of staff and patients has not been accessed or compromised.

“We thought it best to isolate the information system, which we have done,” said Dr. Lawrence Rosenberg. “We are basically an island now, disconnected from the internet.”

Quebec’s health ministry has reportedly been informed and the CIUSSS is working with the ministry’s cybersecurity team.

As of now, the CIUSSS has somewhat gone back in time, as it re-enters the pre-Internet days.

For example, staff were asked to ensure that all patient-care material is printed or moved to a secure external storage device.

Cyberattacks Target Other Care Networks

American Federal agencies warned that cybercriminals are unleashing a wave of data-scrambling extortion attempts against U.S. health care systems. These cyberattack efforts could negatively impact patient care just as COVID-19 cases soar across the U.S. and Canada.

In October, a joint alert was released by the FBI and two federal agencies, warning that they had “credible information of an increased and imminent cybercrime threat to U.S. hospitals and healthcare providers.”

In the summer, Central Health was the target of a proposed class action lawsuit Canada after the private health records of 240 patients were allegedly breached by an unauthorized employee. The violation happened over a span of two years and the employee who accessed the information is reportedly no longer employed with the company.

Privacy breaches and cyberattacks have not only been affecting the health care sector. The federal government and the Canada Revenue Agency are facing a class action lawsuit over a series of cyberattacks that affected Canadians who applied online for emergency aid during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The cyberattacks reportedly affected individuals who had applied for financial assistance from the Canadian Emergency Relief Benefit (CERB) or the Canadian Emergency Student Benefit (CESB), which pays recipients up to $2,000 per month.

COVID-19 Response Slowed Down By Cyberattacks

The computer attack on ICSU’s Centre-Ouest-de-l’Île-de-Montréal has been reportedly delaying the communication of COVID-19 test results.

“We had an attack on the computer network, so we’re doing everything by hand and on the phone and we’re working very, very hard to restore the system,” a telephone operator at the ICSU headquarters reportedly told Le Journal de Montréal.

Patients were told last week that they would have to wait up to seven days for the results of their COVID-19 test.

“Normally it takes two to five days, but right now, yes, it’s taking a week because we’ve had a lot of problems with the computer attack,” the operator said.

However, the CIUSSS communications department has not been releasing the same information as the telephone operators.

“Our timeframes for disclosing a COVID-19 screening test result are exactly the same as before the cyber intrusion, that is to say 24 to 48 hours for a positive test and 24 to 72 hours for a negative test,” assured spokesperson Carl Thériault.

The October cyberattack condemns Montrealers to wait longer for their COVID-19 test results amid the chaos of the second wave.

After the attack, CIUSSS initially declared that its network would remain disconnected from the Internet for 72 hours. However, in the end, the organization will not be able to go back online “for several weeks,” the spokesman now said.

As the Montreal cyberattack threatens to cause more disruption amid the current COVID-19 disarray, stay tuned for the latest COVID-19 legal and consumer issues by checking our Canadian Consumers’ Guide to Coronavirus Outbreak Legal Issues.

Are you worried about the cyberattack’s impact on COVID-19 testing? Has your health data been compromised in a privacy breach? Tell us your story in the comments below!

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