Malware attack on AIIMS server thwarted

An official said that on Tuesday the e-hospital services were fully secure. “A malware attack was detected at 2.50 pm by the cyber security systems in AIIMS. The attempt was successfully thwarted, and the threat was neutralised. The e-hospital services remain to be fully secure and are functioning normally,” the official said.

A photo was also circulated on social media platforms which purportedly showed the e-hospital website of AIIMS not functioning. The Union Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, said there has been no cyber incident or breach. “E-hospital is an internal application, which is not available for internet users. Someone may have tried accessing this portal and alert was generated due to security layer used by AIIMS. The same person may have taken a screenshot of the error message and circulated it. There is no cyber incident or breach. Error messages have been rectified now,” he said.

According to AIIMS officials, the server also remained down for a few hours, so doctors could not fetch patient data. However, it is not clear if this happened due to the malware attack, officials said.

In November and December last year, the cyber attack on the institute server’s lasted more than 15 days.

A case of extortion and cyber terrorism was also registered by the Intelligence Fusion and Strategic Operations (IFSO) unit of the Delhi Police on November 25.

Post the attack, AIIMS had decided to strengthen its e-hospital network and said it would only be allowed on a dedicated and secure AIIMS LAN/intranet network maintained by its computer facility department.