US hospital chain CommonSpirit Well being says ‘IT safety concern’ is disrupting companies • TechCrunch

CommonSpirit, the second-largest nonprofit hospital chain within the U.S., has confirmed a cybersecurity incident that’s disrupting medical companies throughout the nation.

In a quick assertion, Chicago-based CommonSpirit stated the “IT safety concern” is impacting a few of CommonSpirit’s services and a few affected person appointments have been rescheduled consequently.

“CommonSpirit Well being is managing an IT safety concern that’s impacting a few of our services,” stated the hospital big, which operates greater than 700 care websites and 142 hospitals in 21 states. “As a precautionary step, we have now taken sure IT techniques offline, which can embrace digital well being document and different techniques.”

“Our services are following current protocols for system outages and taking steps to reduce the disruption. We take our accountability to make sure the safety of our IT techniques very critically. On account of this concern, we have now rescheduled some affected person appointments. Sufferers shall be contacted immediately by their supplier and/or care facility if their appointment is impacted.”

CommonSpirit has but to verify the character of the safety incident, and it’s unknown if affected person info or well being information was compromised. When reached, CommonSpirit spokesperson Chad Burns declined to remark past the group’s assertion.

The extent of the disruption brought on by the difficulty is rising. CommonSpirit’s Nebraska-based subsidiary, CHI Well being, reported outages throughout its Omaha hospitals, and MercyOne Des Moines Medical Heart has shut down a few of its IT techniques, together with entry to its digital well being information.

In July, U.S. cybersecurity company CISA, the FBI and the U.S. Treasury warned in a joint assertion that North Korea-backed hackers have been focusing on healthcare and public well being sector organizations throughout the U.S. with ransomware.

The warning adopted a spate of high-profile assaults on U.S. healthcare techniques, together with College Medical Heart Southern Nevada, Eskenazi Well being, and Kaiser Permanente.