National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS) Details

National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS)

Johannesburg, South Africa • 6500 employees • Healthcare

https://www.nhls.ac.za/

South Africa

Industry

Healthcare

Security Incidents

The National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS) is a South African national government institution established in 2001 through the merger of the South African Institute for Medical Research (SAIMR), the National Centre for Occupational Health, and the National Institute for Virology. Additionally, it incorporated various provincial health department and university-run pathology laboratories. The NHLS serves as the primary diagnostic pathology service for the public health sector in South Africa, providing critical diagnostic services to public hospitals and clinics nationwide.

Operating a netwo...
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Security Incidents

National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS) Breach of Jun 2024

Severity Score

Significant to High

Type

Ransomware Attack

Summary

On June 22, the BlackSuit ransomware group targeted South Africa's National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS), severely disrupting its operations. The attack crippled NHLS's ability to process millions of blood tests, significantly delaying the diagnosis and treatment of serious conditions, including tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, and mpox. NHLS, managing a network of 256 laboratories, had to shut down its IT systems, including email, websites, and patient data retrieval systems, to mitigate the attack's effects.

This disruption has led healthcare professionals to relay urgent test results via teleph...
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Severity

The ransomware attack against South Africa's National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS) significantly disrupted healthcare services, leaving lives at risk and creating widespread chaos. On June 22, the BlackSuit ransomware group disabled NHLS's ability to process millions of blood tests, impacting critical diagnostics for diseases such as tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, and mpox. The incident resulted in major operational delays, with urgent test results being communicated via telephone and hundreds of essential surgeries cancelled due to unprocessed blood tests.

Given the extensive impact on public h...
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Impact

The ransomware attack on South Africa's National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS), orchestrated by the BlackSuit ransomware group, had significant operational impacts. The shutdown of NHLS's IT systems, including email, website, and patient lab test result systems, disrupted over 6.3 million blood tests and delayed crucial healthcare services, particularly for conditions such as tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, and mpox.

While there was no immediate exposure of customer data, the attackers threatened to delete or release over one terabyte of sensitive data, adding a significant risk of data loss or l...
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