FBI thwarts attempted Iranian hack of Boston Children’s Hospital

Boston Children's Hospital was almost impacted by an attempted cyberattack by Iranian state-sponsored hackers last year, which has been thwarted by the FBI, according to CNN. Despite the successful operation of the FBI, the attempted hack, which involved the exploitation of Fortinet security vulnerabilities, indicates the U.S.'s elevated risks of high-impact attacks from Iran, China, Russia, and North Korea, said FBI Director Christopher Wray. FBI's Boston Field Office Special Agent in Charge Joseph Bonavolonta noted that the attack was averted with the help of an intelligence community partner. "There was no ransomware deployed and we were able to work with [the hospital] ahead of time to mitigate any of the other potential associated threats to the network," said Bonavolonta. The claimed averted attack on Boston Children's Hospital comes after Recorded Future reported that publicly disclosed healthcare ransomware incidents rose from 106 in 2020 to 134 last year. Meanwhile, the FBI's allegations have been panned as "baseless" by Shahrokh Nazemi, a spokesperson for Iran's Permanent Mission to the United Nations.