A Russian group of cyber criminals is behind the ransomware attack affecting major London hospitals, the former chief executive of the National Cyber Security Centre has said. Ciaran Martin said the attack on pathology services firm Synnovis has led to a “severe reduction in capacity” and “it’s a very, very serious incident”. Hospitals declared a critical incident after the attack and have cancelled operations and tests and been unable to carry out blood transfusions.
Memos to NHS staff at King’s College Hospital, Guy’s and St Thomas’ (including the Royal Brompton and the Evelina London Children’s Hospital) and primary care services in the capital said there had been a “major IT incident”. Asked on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme if it is known who attacked Synnovis, Mr Martin said: “Yes. We believe it is a Russian group of cyber criminals who call themselves Qilin.
“These criminal groups – there are quite a few of them – they operate freely from within Russia, they give themselves high-profile names, they’ve got websites on the so-called dark web, and this particular group has about a two-year history of attacking various organisations across the world. “They’ve done automotive companies, they’ve attacked the Big Issue here in the UK, they’ve attacked Australian courts. They’re simply looking for money.
” He said it is “unlikely” the Russian hackers would have known they would cause such serious primary healthcare disruption whe.
