The NCSC's annual review says the company is doing even more to protect healthcare.
The UK's National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) is "boosting support" for the National Health Service to help protect UK hospitals and other healthcare organisations from cyberattacks.
The NCSC's Annual Review 2020 reveals that GCHQ has handled more than 200 cyber incidents related to COVID-19 during this year – almost a third of the total number of incidents it was called upon to assist with during that period.
And because of the urgent need to secure healthcare during the coronavirus pandemic, the NCSC is helping the NHS protect itself from cyberattacks.
This includes hunting for threats across 1.4 million NHS endpoints in an effort to detect potentially suspicious activity and scanning one million NHS IP addresses to identify cybersecurity vulnerabilities.
“The second half of the year for us, as it is for everyone, is dominated by COVID-19,” said Lindy Cameron, CEO of the NCSC.
"What we've done as an organization is really geared toward the healthcare sector to try to give them the best support we can think of for their cyber defense to let them focus on dealing with the pandemic," he added.
The NCSC has also helped roll out Active Cyber Defence services, such as Web Check, Mail Check and protected DNS, to 235 frontline health organisations across the UK, including NHS Trusts to protect them from phishing attacks and other threats.
More than 160 high-risk vulnerabilities have been shared with NHS Trusts this year, while the NCSC has also had to deal with over 200 incidents related to COVID-19 in the UK – including Russian cyber espionage targeting the development of coronavirus vaccines.
The 200 COVID-19-related incidents make up a significant portion of the total number of 723 cyberattacks – the highest number of incidents since the NCSC was founded. It’s also a number that is likely to continue to rise as cybercriminals become more ambitious.
The review also notes that the NCSC has faced three times more ransomware than last year, as attacks become more targeted and more aggressive.
