A massive cyber attack against the Hillel Yaffe Medical Center in Hadera hospital launched on Wednesday rendered all its systems unusable, and as of Thursday afternoon, the incident is still ongoing.
The hospital’s director, Dr. Miki Dodkevitz, told that cyber experts from the Israeli government were working around the clock to restore the hospital’s systems.
“It is difficult to assess when we will return to normal activity. I hope it will be as soon as possible,” said Dodkevitz, who added that the hospital was operating as best it could with manual records and some alternate computer systems.
Devices like MRIs and CAT scans had not been affected by the hack, Dodkevitz noted, adding that patients’ lives were never endangered by the cyber attack.
“In the spirit of caution, we said that we would reduce the elective, non-urgent activity that can be postponed for a day or two. We did not transfer patients from our hospital to other hospitals.”
Although some speculated that the incident was an act of sabotage perpetrated by an enemy state, such as Iran, hospital officials and Israeli security sources said they believe it is a ransomware attack.
“[The hackers] left an email address with which you can communicate with them. I do not know if they presented a demand for money at this stage, but it will probably come,” Dr. Harel Manshari, a cyber security professor at the Holon Institute of Technology, told today.
Whoever is behind the attack will likely demand an exorbitant sum of money in exchange for a return to normalcy.