Massive US healthcare payment network finally restored after ransomware attack
- Change Healthcare’s clearinghouse services have been restored
- The organization suffered a massive ransomware attack in February
- The attack has so far cost the country more than $2 billion
Change Healthcare has confirmed that clearinghouse services have finally been restored after the organization suffered a massive ransomware attack in February 2024.
The recovery from the Change Healthcare cyber attack has been arduous, costing nearly $2 billion to date, with some systems still unrecovered nearly nine months later.
Although most of the network has been restored after two months, some functions are still not fully restored, including pharmacy claims management and e-health record exchange systems.
100 million affected
The operations of Change Healthcare and parent company UnitedHealth Group involve 1 in 3 patient records in the US, processing 15 billion healthcare transactions annually.
The attack caused unprecedented disruption to U.S. billing and payment providers and threatened the viability of hospitals across the country.
It was recently revealed that the attack exposed the information of as many as 100 million people, stealing 6TB of sensitive data, including health insurance information, billing, claims, payment information and more.
UnitedHealth reportedly paid $22 million to the infamous ALPHV group in exchange for the data, but remediation from the attack alone cost $873 million, so costs continue to rise.
According to reports, the ransom never made it to the affiliates responsible for the attack and was seized in its entirety by the ransomware operators, who would only receive a portion.
The attackers reportedly used stolen credentials to log into a Citrix portal that did not have multi-factor authentication enabled, leaving the organization vulnerable.
It is likely that the impact of the attack will be felt well into the future, with some systems yet to be restored. Healthcare providers reported that as of early March 2024, 60% of hospitals in the association saw revenue shortfalls of $1 million or more per day, and a third of providers had more than half of their revenues impacted.
Via The registry
