Hackers have attacked the vaccination registration system in one of Italy's largest regions, temporarily preventing residents from booking new vaccination appointments, officials said.
Residents of Lazio, which includes Rome, will not be able to make new appointments for several days, the region's president, Nicola Zingaretti, said on Facebook on Monday.
While the identity and motives of the hackers were not immediately clear, the incident appeared to be a ransomware attack, said Allan Liska, an analyst who analyzes such attacks for cybersecurity firm Recorded Future.
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In his Facebook post, Zingaretti said that hackers made almost every file in the system's data center inaccessible and that the regional health network shut down the servers to prevent the attack from spreading further.
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This is a telltale sign of ransomware hackers, who encrypt the files of a computer network in the hope that they can extort a payment from the owners in exchange for a key that could make them useful again.
"This is the language we typically see when an attack turns out to be a ransomware attack," Liska said.
"This comes from reviewing hundreds of interviews from cities and schools that have been affected by ransomware. Even when they don't use the term 'ransomware,' they almost always report not being able to access files," he said.
Zingaretti hacker or hackers as criminals.
The attack occurred over the weekend, a common time for hackers who know they are less likely to be detected and prevented when fewer employees are on site.
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Residents who had already booked their vaccination appointments can still go get their shot, Zingaretti wrote.
Source of information: nbcnews.com
