Background

The healthcare industry remains a critical target for cybercriminals, with patient data proving to be a lucrative commodity on the black market. The recent escalation of cyberattacks on healthcare organizations emphasizes the need for an effective and affordable solution to this escalating problem.

Among the recent victims were major healthcare organizations Change Healthcare and Concentra Health Services. The cyberattack on Change Healthcare in February 2024 compromised the personal information of over 14 million patients, including Social Security numbers, addresses, and medical information. The aftershocks of this attack continue to unfold. To date, Optum, which owns Change Healthcare, made a $22M ransomware payment to the threat actors. In April 2023, Concentra Health Services fell victim to a ransomware attack that threatened the privacy of millions of patients. Other recent incidents include:

• Targeted attack on Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital in Chicago
• Successful MOVEit zero-day attack on VA-based Maximus Inc., a government services contracting company, with PHI of between 8 and 11 million individuals compromised
• 11 million patient data breach at the nation’s largest health system, HCA Healthcare
• Misappropriation of clinical test information of 2.4 million patients at Enzo Biochem
• Attacks affecting pharma services provider PharMerica, Ohio-based CareSource, and the Tampa General Hospital, to name but a few others

To date, Optum, which owns Change Healthcare, made a $22M ransomware payment to the threat actors.

The attraction of cybercriminals to the healthcare industry is unsurprising, given the value of medical records and personal health information. The sector’s increasing reliance on interconnected devices and digital transformation has expanded the attack surface, making healthcare organizations more susceptible to attacks. The situation is exacerbated by the seemingly high cost associated with adopting robust cybersecurity measures.

Why the attacks are so successful

In today’s environment, it is just not possible to prevent cybercriminals from infiltrating your computing environment, because of techniques and tactics available to hackers, particularly
Zero-day exploits, social engineering tactics, and supply-chain attacks:

• Zero-day exploits are vulnerabilities in software or hardware that are unknown to the vendor or developers.
  • Cyber attackers leverage these vulnerabilities to launch attacks before a fix or patch is developed and released, and exploit them to gain unauthorized access to systems, steal sensitive data, or execute malicious code.
  • Even after these vulnerabilities are discovered, they often continue to be significant problems for IT staff for months and even years afterward, because of difficulties in deploying complex patching routines and work overloads on IT departments.
• Social engineering tactics involve manipulating individuals to divulge confidential information, perform certain actions, or grant access to systems or data. Attackers exploit human psychology rather than technical vulnerabilities to achieve their objectives.
  • Common social engineering techniques include phishing emails, pretexting (creating a false scenario to obtain information), baiting (enticing victims with promises of rewards), and impersonation.
  • By exploiting trust, curiosity, fear, or urgency, attackers deceive individuals into compromising security measures, leading to unauthorized access.
• Supply-chain attacks target the software or hardware supply chain to compromise the security of a broader ecosystem of users. Attackers infiltrate trusted suppliers, vendors, or manufacturers to inject malicious code or tamper with products during the development or distribution process.
  • When these compromised products are deployed or used by organizations or individuals, they serve as vehicles for cyber-attacks that can have far-reaching consequences.
  • They frequently affect multiple organizations and individuals who rely on the compromised products or services.

This evolving world of cybercrime means that some level of hacker infiltration is becoming increasingly likely. Zero-day exploits, social engineering, and supply chain attacks bypass authentication and Endpoint Detection and Response defenses. Identity & Access Controls (IAC) and firewalls are generally blind to these advanced tactics. These criminal tactics allow hackers to establish a foothold within your network or cloud environment, plant malware remotely, and establish persistent access. Once inside, they can move laterally, escalate privileges, and deploy ransomware or other malicious payloads. After the initial breach, the hackers can gain control of critical systems and obfuscate their identity while conducting malicious campaigns. The compromised systems become the hackers’ base of operations, and their tactics and techniques make it difficult to detect their presence.

Fortune 100 companies and other very large enterprises appear to be highly successful in defending against these attacks; how do they do it?

In the circumstances where it is not possible to block the intruder in the first instance, effective cyber defense demands a holistic cybersecurity solution. This requires monitoring, gathering, and analyzing critical data from both on premise and cloud environments, integrated with a threat intelligence platform, continuous vulnerability detection, and real-time responses from a 24/7 security operations center staffed by highly skilled analysts and engineers. This is the approach being deployed by very large enterprises, with great success. Although effective, these advanced solutions often are not available to mid-market enterprises because of high costs.

Our innovative approach to solving this problem

At SECNAP, we recognized the need for a comprehensive cybersecurity solution that emulates the holistic approach being applied successfully at financial institutions, but affordable for everyone. In response, we created CloudJacket, a Managed Detection and Response (MDR) service that combines technology and human expertise to safeguard your organization from malware, ransomware, data breaches, unauthorized access, and other sophisticated cyberattacks. CloudJacket MDR works by constantly monitoring your network, endpoints, devices, and cloud environments, employing a combination of advanced technologies to identify threats. Once a threat is identified, our team of security specialists will investigate, and take action to contain and respond to the threat. MDR provides 24/7 protection even if your business lacks the staff or in-house knowledge to handle cybersecurity concerns. This approach ensures that even sophisticated and previously unknown threats are swiftly identified and addressed.

In response to these growing threats, we have created CloudJacket, a multi-layered MDR security solution designed to both address the unique challenges faced by healthcare organizations, and yet be affordable by everyone.

CloudJacket is a complete security platform. It provides an all-encompassing, multifaceted cybersecurity solution that matches the robust defenses used by Fortune 500 companies:

• Unparalleled Visibility: CloudJacket goes beyond traditional EDR, providing Extended Detection and Response (XDR) capabilities. This grants healthcare organizations a unified view of activity across all endpoints, networks, cloud environments, and user behavior. This comprehensive visibility allows for early detection of suspicious activity and potential breaches.
• Data collection techniques: Using both software agents (lightweight and multi-purpose, installed on endpoints such as laptops, desktops, servers, cloud instances, and virtual machines) and agentless monitoring (for firewalls, switches, routers, etc.), CloudJacket collects data from all key sources in network and cloud environments.
• Advanced Threat Detection: CloudJacket leverages its cutting-edge threat intelligence engine and machine learning to identify and neutralize even the most sophisticated cyberattacks. CloudJacket’s eXtended intelligence engine analyzes network traffic, user behavior, and endpoint activity to detect anomalies and identify potential threats before they can compromise patient data or disrupt critical systems. It uses our proprietary software to analyze and correlate the data to accurately parse through the millions of potential threats and behavioral anomalies that occur daily in a network or cloud, identifying those that are real threats, and presenting these threats to our U.S.-based SOC analysts for final analysis via our proprietary security operations centers’ dashboard.
• Proactive Threat Hunting: CloudJacket goes beyond passive detection. Our team of cybersecurity experts actively hunts for threats within your network, proactively identifying vulnerabilities and potential attack vectors before they can be exploited. This proactive approach significantly reduces the risk of successful cyberattacks.
• Compliance Management: The healthcare industry is subject to a myriad of complex compliance regulations, including HIPAA and HITRUST. CloudJacket simplifies compliance by providing automated reporting and documentation, ensuring your organization remains compliant with relevant regulations.
• Eliminate Alert Fatigue — 24/7/365 Security Operations Center (SOC): Our dedicated team of highly-trained security professionals based in the USA monitors your network around the clock, providing real-time threat detection, investigation, and response. This eliminates the hundreds (or even thousands) of daily alerts your IT staff would otherwise need to handle from traditional cybersecurity solutions, and ensures your organization has access to the expertise needed to effectively respond to any security incident.

With us, you get an unparalleled blend of protection, detection, and response capabilities, all bundled into one powerful package. CloudJacket provides state-of-the-art protection against malware, ransomware, data breaches, unauthorized access, and other sophisticated attack vectors. Our value lies not just in our defense system, but in the peace of mind we provide, allowing you to focus solely on driving your business to new heights. Explore CloudJacket, go to https://www.secnap.com/cloudjacket/.

Don’t Wait Until It’s Too Late

Cyberattacks are a constant threat to the healthcare industry. Don’t wait for a breach to expose the vulnerabilities in your healthcare IT environment. Discover how CloudJacket can transform your cybersecurity posture. Contact us to learn more and take the first step towards ensuring your organization has the comprehensive security solution needed to protect your patients, your data. Complete the contact form or call 954-350-0712.

Resources:
https://www.scmagazine.com/news/change-healthcare-breach-data-may-be-in-hands-of-new-ransomware-group
https://www.hipaajournal.com/up-to-11-million-health-records-maximus-data-breach/
https://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/lurie-childrens-has-resumed-e-mail-communications
https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/health-tech/hca-healthcare-reports-data-breach-potentially-impacting-11m-patients
https://www.hipaajournal.com/clinical-test-data-of-2-5-million-individuals-stolen-in-enzo-biochem-ransomware-attack/
https://www.hipaajournal.com/hipaa-breaches/