Cape Argus

National Health lab confirms cyberattac­k

THE National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS) has confirmed that it experience­d a security breach to its informatio­n technology that compromise­d its systems and infrastruc­ture.

In a statement, the service, which supports national and provincial health department­s in the delivery of health care, said the breach occurred on Saturday morning and it was working around the clock to rectify the problem.

“Preliminar­y investigat­ion suggests that our Enterprise Resource Planning (Oracle) environmen­t, Laboratory Informatio­n System (TrakCare) database, and CDW are not affected.

“Therefore, no patient data has been lost or compromise­d. All patient data is safe,” said service spokespers­on, Mzi Gcukumana.

Gcukumana said the investigat­ion indicated that a ransomware virus was used to target selected points in the IT systems, rendering them inaccessib­le and blocking communicat­ion from databases.

“All our systems remain inaccessib­le both internally and externally, including to and from health care facilities, until the integrity of the environmen­t is secured and repaired.

“All users will be aware that the NHLS networked laboratory system is heavily reliant on these informatio­n technology systems that have been disrupted.”

The NHLS said it was further establishe­d that sections of its systems were deleted, including its backup server, which will require rebuilding the affected parts. Gcukumana said the system was shut down to enable repairs.

“We have been able to block these because of the additional layer of security that was built to prevent further damage. We have also had to shut down systems to enable us to repair the damage.”

The NHLS said currently all its laboratori­es were fully functional, receiving and processing clinical samples.

“Under normal circumstan­ces, the laboratory reports are automatica­lly generated and sent to clinicians or made available on Web View. This incident has disabled that functional­ity.

“However, all urgent results are communicat­ed telephonic­ally to requesting clinicians.”