Ransom paid to hackers by Truman Medical Centers for unlocking the system

Truman Medical Centers (TMC) has suffered from a ransomware attack on August 6, 2019, and then had to pay ransom amount for unlocking the parts of their organizational system and again get back access of their organizational system. The TMC is based in Kansas City of Missouri.

The Missouri's Kansas City hospital has released a statement, which says that the Information Technology (IT) team of the Truman Medical Centers learned about this ransomware early on the morning of August 6, 2019. The IT team has received a message on August 6, 2019, that the organization becomes victim of ransomware attack. The malicious software has blocked hospital from gaining access to parts of their organizational system till the money demanded has been paid.

"Simply put, this means there was someone who locked TMC out of parts of its own organizational system. They demanded money, or a ransom, to unlock the programs," Truman Medical Centers said in the statement.

The TMC said that it consulted and worked with an outside (i.e. third-party) negotiator, their cyber insurance carrier as well as third-party cybersecurity experts; and then paid some (small amount) money as per them. The hospital discloses that they were insured for the amount that was paid to the attackers.

TMC said patients' financial information and health records are stored on another computer system, so they were not affected by this ransomware attack. The hospital also added that patient care was not impacted.

Leslie Carto, a Truman spokeswoman, said that "they weren't looking for information. It looks like they were more looking for ransom". Carto has declined to reveal the ransom money paid by Truman to free up their computer system.

"We will continue to provide quality care to all our patients as we bring the affected parts of our operational programs back on track," said the officials of Truman Medical Center in a statement.

Last month, Park DuValle Community Health Center, a healthcare provider of Kentucky's Louisville city, paid the hackers ransom amount of $70,000 in bitcoin for unlocking medical records of around 20,000 patients after ransomware attack has locked up their system for almost two months, as per news accounts there.

» SPAMfighter News - 8/27/2019