Ransomware in healthcare: Time for CISOs to build resilience and response – Intelligent CISO>
Intelligent CISO – Mark Bowen
The UK’s healthcare sector faces a growing threat from ransomware, presenting a significant challenge for patient health and healthcare organizations’ financial stability.
Healthcare CISOs are urged to build resilience and enhance incident response to confront these escalating cyberattacks, with the sector’s unique challenges making it a prime target for ransomware.
Factors contributing to the sector’s exposure include the complexity and diversity of the attack surface, which spans a multitude of devices and technologies.
Factors such as the pressure on healthcare workers, unaddressed vulnerabilities, and the involvement of a vast supply chain contribute to the heightened risk.
Continuously evolving threat actor tactics and the rising use of double extortion in cyberattacks elevate the severity of the threat.
Furthermore, an EU security agency report indicates that ransomware accounts for over half of sector threats, with significant repercussions for affected organizations, including operational and financial disruptions, patient safety risks, and potential trust erosion.
In response to these challenges, healthcare CISOs are advised to pursue thorough cybersecurity audits, implement risk-based patch management programs, and establish robust detection and response capabilities.
Effective logging and monitoring, incident response preparedness, and compliance with industry standards are emphasized to mitigate the impact of potential breaches.
The imperative to maintain recent backups and resilience in critical data security practices remain high priorities, stressing the need for a comprehensive and proactive approach to security to address the inevitability of cyberattacks and reduce their adverse effects on healthcare organizations.
Link: https://www.intelligentciso.com/2023/12/06/ransomware-in-healthcare-time-for-cisos-to-build-resilience-and-response/