Universal Health Services, one of the largest healthcare providers in the U.S., has been victim of a ransomware attack that led to disruption in IT systems in all of UHS locations and possibly resulted in patient data theft, BleepingComputer reports.
The attack that took place at the end of August 2021, was reportedly conducted by the Vice Society ransomware gang, a relatively new ransomware operation that has been active since June this year.
While UHC has yet to release an official statement regarding the alleged August attack, BleepingComputer said that this week Vice Society has published some of the data allegedly stolen fr om UHS on their data leak website. The leaked files include sensitive information, such as patient benefits, financial documents, patient lab results, and audits.
When asked by BleepingComputer why they allow hospitals to be targeted when most of ransomware groups prohibit attacks on hospitals and medical facilities, the Vice Society ransomware gang responded as follows:
"Why not?
They always keep our private data open. You, me and anyone else go to hospitals, give them our passports, share our health problems etc. and they don't even try to protect our data. They have billions of government money. Do they steal that money?
USA president gave big amount to protect government networks and wh ere is their protection? Where is our protection?
If IT department don't want to do their job we will do ours and we don't care if it hospital or university."