MADRID, 3 Jan. (Portaltic/EP) –
The hospital for children SickKids in Toronto, Canada, was left without access to its systems in December after a ransomware attack executed by the Lockbit group, which has apologized and offered the decryption tool for free.
The hospital suffered a ‘ransomware’ attack on December 18 that encrypted its systems, which has delayed the diagnoses and treatment of hospitalized children. Although the hospital’s technical teams managed to gradually recover 50 percent of the critical systems by the 29th of the same month, they could not advance a date for the complete restoration.
The ‘ransomware’ attack was the work of the Lockbit group, which on December 31 issued a brief statement to apologize for what happenedwho shared the researcher and security analyst Domic Alvieri.
“We formally apologize for the hijacking of SickKids and are giving the decryptor free of charge in return. The partner who attacked this hospital violated our rules, is blocked and is no longer part of our affiliate program,” they explain in the statement.
Breaking LockBit offers decryptor for free. LockBit affiliate breach violated their rules for The Hospital for Sick Children and offers the decryptor for free./sickkids.ca@CBC @globeandmail #cybersecurity #infosec #LockBit @BleepinComputer @TheRecord_Media pic.twitter.com/5k54IkPUIX
— Dominic Alvieri (@AlvieriD) December 31, 2022
On January 1, the Hospital confirmed that it was aware of Lockbit’s statement, announcing that they had engaged outside experts to “validate and evaluate the use of the decryptor.” That day the decryption works they had recovered just over 60 percent of the priority systems, and there was no indication that personal or health data had been accessed.
