Mitigating Risk Against Ransomware in the Healthcare Sector

Introduction

Healthcare institutions hold vast amounts of highly sensitive information on large portions of the population — from basic details such as a person’s name and address, to their unique and detailed medical history — and as such, patient records are a high target for ransomware attacks.

Bad actors and cyber criminals seek this data for many different reasons. This valuable data can be used for crimes such as identity theft. Still, healthcare breaches are particularly serious because personal data can, in some cases, mean the difference between life and death. It is, therefore, vitally important for CIOs within the healthcare sector to build secure IT infrastructures that not only withstand ransomware attacks but ensure this critical data remains available. Ransomware attacks have only intensified under the pressure of the COVID-19 pandemic.1

The stakes have never been higher for healthcare to manage, implement, and execute effective data management strategies. Failure to do so will leave them vulnerable to potential ransomware attacks and may have long-lasting implications for their customers’ lives and livelihoods.

While the threat of ransomware is an incredibly complex and significant responsibility for organisations — some steps can be taken to mitigate risk from the outset.

In this paper, Rick Vanover, a senior director of product strategy from Veeam, will provide a number of methods to provide the healthcare industry with practical steps to protect data and avoid falling victim to ransomware attacks. These strategies will explore not only how to configure Veeam products to recover from ransomware, but also other tools and techniques to address ransomware head-on.