In the US, the Darkside APT group crippled the largest fuel supplier in the northeast, causing a system wide shutdown affecting nearly the entire US east coast’s fuel supply for several days. In Europe, a double whammy hit the Irish health system when the Health Service Executive, Ireland’s health care operator and its Department of Health suffered a ransomware attack forcing a shutdown within its IT infrastructure.

The health sector is regarded as a vulnerable sector to cyber incidents and crises. In the ENISA Threat Landscape report, it was found that more than 66% of healthcare organizations experienced a ransomware attack in 2019. “In 2019, 45% of attacked organizations paid the ransom. The 45% of organizations that were attacked and paid the ransom, half still lost their data.”