The Kuwait Ministry of Health has been dealing with a cyber attack that has impacted the operation of several hospitals and the Sahel mobile application, which is used to provide medical services. Currently, the official website of the Ministry of Health is inaccessible, but the department has released a statement through the Kuwait News Agency.
Efforts have been made to restore systems that control the National Center for Combating Cancer, as well as departments responsible for national medical insurance and inspections for foreign citizens using reserve copies. Despite the challenges faced, authorities have assured that necessary steps have been taken to ensure the continuous functioning of essential medical services in primary care centers and state hospitals.
An investigation into the cyber attack revealed how the attackers breached the systems. The ministry has stated that all necessary measures have been implemented to prevent the threat from spreading to other systems. While the most critical databases were not affected, some systems had to be temporarily shut down for updates and security reinforcement.
The exact timeline for the complete restoration of all systems has not been provided yet, but the ministry aims to achieve this in the near future. No group has claimed responsibility for the cyber attack at this time.
Notably, a year ago, the Kuwait Ministry of Finance was targeted by the Rhysida hacker group. Prior to that, the Vice Society group, allegedly linked to Rhysida, targeted several IKEA stores in Kuwait.
According to a recent report by a large cybersecurity consortium, in 2023, a record number of countries, over 117, experienced attacks by ransomware groups. A total of 6670 incidents were recorded, marking a 73% increase compared to the previous year.