Boston Scientific cyberattack: Cork staff asked to work remotely
The $69bn company expects further disruption while it works to restore affected systems.
Boston Scientific’s global operations have been disrupted in a cyberattack on its IT systems.
The medtech giant said it discovered the incident on 25 August. “The incident has impacted access to certain operating systems and business applications, including the ability to process and ship customer orders,” it said in a statement published yesterday (26 August).
The $69bn company expects further disruption while it works to restore affected systems. A probe into the attack is ongoing, but no concrete timeline has emerged yet, it added.
The company said that it is unaware, as of yet, whether this incident might have any material impact on its business. Shares fell more than 3pc at market close yesterday and gained marginally in after-hours trading.
Boston Scientific employs around 7,000 across its three sites in Galway, Cork and Clonmel. The company’s Cork-based workers were asked to work from home yesterday, several news publications confirmed. SiliconRepublic.com has reached out to Boston Scientific for further information.
Boston Scientific is the latest target in a series of cyberattacks affecting pharmaceutical and medical technology companies.
Medical equipment manufacturing giant Stryker was hit by a cyberattack earlier this year that caused a global network disruption. Reports at the time suggested that the company’s Cork plant, which employs more than 4,000, was affected in the attack.
In April, Dublin recruitment platform Healthdaq – which is used by Northern Ireland’s health trusts – reportedly suffered a cyberattack from the relatively new hacker group XP95, which claimed to have accessed hundreds of thousands of files.
Several other medtech businesses, including Medtronic, West Pharmaceutical, Novo Nordisk, Amgen and Abbott Laboratories have also reported cyberattacks in recent months.
A RunSafe report earlier this year discovered a marginal rise in cyberattacks on medical devices, with 80pc of those attacked reporting a moderate or significant impact on patient care.
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Suhasini Srinivasaragavan is a sci-tech reporter for Silicon Republic
