Weiser Memorial Hospital in Idaho this week confirmed it notified 34,249 people of a September 2024 data breach that compromised names, SSNs, government-issued ID numbers, treatments and procedures, medical diagnoses, health insurance info, and DOBs. Ransomware gang Embargo claimed responsibility for the breach in September 2024, but Weiser has not yet verified this.
In a blog post reporting this news, Paul Bischoff, Consumer Privacy Advocate at Comparitech, wrote:
“Embargo is a ransomware gang that started claiming attacks in April 2024. The group operates a ransomware-as-a-service business in which affiliates pay Embargo to use its malware and infrastructure to launch attacks and collect ransoms.”
“Embargo has claimed 14 confirmed ransomware attacks since it began, compromising about 736,000 records. Another 10 unconfirmed claims haven’t been acknowledged by the targeted organizations.”
“Comparitech researchers logged 161 confirmed ransomware attacks on US hospitals, clinics, and other direct care providers in 2024, compromising 27.2 million records. In 2025 to date, we tracked 20 such attacks affecting nearly 1.6 million records. The average ransom across all attacks is about $1.03 million.”
“Ransomware attacks on US hospitals, clinics, and other care providers can cripple key systems and endanger the privacy and security of patients. Providers must pay a ransom or face extended downtime, data loss, and putting patients and staff at increased risk of fraud. Hospitals and clinics might have to resort to pen and paper, cancel appointments, and divert patients elsewhere until systems are restored.”
The Embargo ransomware gang is new to me. Which illustrates how fast new ransomware gangs are popping up. That’s incredibly bad for all of us as there are more threat actors out there that can do harm to organizations. What needs to happen is the conditions need to exist to make ransomware less profitable so to speak, which in turn will reduce the number of threat actors making the world a bit safer.
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This entry was posted on May 14, 2025 at 1:24 pm and is filed under Commentary with tags Hacked. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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Idaho hospital notifies 34K people of data breach that compromised SSNs, health info
Weiser Memorial Hospital in Idaho this week confirmed it notified 34,249 people of a September 2024 data breach that compromised names, SSNs, government-issued ID numbers, treatments and procedures, medical diagnoses, health insurance info, and DOBs. Ransomware gang Embargo claimed responsibility for the breach in September 2024, but Weiser has not yet verified this.
In a blog post reporting this news, Paul Bischoff, Consumer Privacy Advocate at Comparitech, wrote:
“Embargo is a ransomware gang that started claiming attacks in April 2024. The group operates a ransomware-as-a-service business in which affiliates pay Embargo to use its malware and infrastructure to launch attacks and collect ransoms.”
“Embargo has claimed 14 confirmed ransomware attacks since it began, compromising about 736,000 records. Another 10 unconfirmed claims haven’t been acknowledged by the targeted organizations.”
“Comparitech researchers logged 161 confirmed ransomware attacks on US hospitals, clinics, and other direct care providers in 2024, compromising 27.2 million records. In 2025 to date, we tracked 20 such attacks affecting nearly 1.6 million records. The average ransom across all attacks is about $1.03 million.”
“Ransomware attacks on US hospitals, clinics, and other care providers can cripple key systems and endanger the privacy and security of patients. Providers must pay a ransom or face extended downtime, data loss, and putting patients and staff at increased risk of fraud. Hospitals and clinics might have to resort to pen and paper, cancel appointments, and divert patients elsewhere until systems are restored.”
The Embargo ransomware gang is new to me. Which illustrates how fast new ransomware gangs are popping up. That’s incredibly bad for all of us as there are more threat actors out there that can do harm to organizations. What needs to happen is the conditions need to exist to make ransomware less profitable so to speak, which in turn will reduce the number of threat actors making the world a bit safer.
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This entry was posted on May 14, 2025 at 1:24 pm and is filed under Commentary with tags Hacked. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.