Irish health service shut down after being hit by ‘very sophisticated’ ransomware attack

Ireland’s health service operator shut down all its IT systems on Friday to protect them from a “significant” ransomware attack, crippling diagnostic services, disrupting Covid-19 testing and forcing hospitals to cancel many appointments.

An international cyber crime gang was behind the attack, Ireland’s minister responsible for e-government said, describing it as possibly the most significant cyber crime attempt against the Irish state.

Ireland’s Covid-19 vaccination programme was not directly affected, but the attack was affecting IT systems serving all other local and national health provision, the head of the Health Service Executive (HSE) said.

“This is not espionage. It was an international attack, but this is just a cyber criminal gang looking for money,”