Tyler Cross
Published on: February 3, 2025
The New York Blood Center Enterprises (NYBCe) reported a ransomware attack that dealt serious damage to their organization.
The attack comes amid a blood shortage that was already putting stress on the company. Last week, a joint statement between the New York and New Jersey blood centers declared a blood shortage emergency. The devastating ransomware attack couldn’t have happened at a worse time.
In lieu of the attack, NYBCe is having trouble filling orders and restoring its critical services.
According to the incident report recently published by NYBCe, the attack took place on Wednesday, Jan. 26. In response, the company immediately took its systems offline in an attempt to prevent the hacker from dealing further damage, but enough harm had already been dealt that there is no current restoration timetable.
It explained that donors should expect longer processing times and to have appointments rescheduled. Many blood drives are also being rescheduled. Despite all of that, blood centers are still up and running and they still encourage donations.
The exact details of the hack are currently unknown. It’s unsure how the hackers infiltrated NYBCe’s network or exfiltrated its data, what malware strain was used, or who the threat actors were. As of now, no group has come forward to claim responsibility for the hack.
It’s possible that the attack was meant to deal damage to critical US infrastructure during the blood shortage, but there is no conclusive evidence of this yet.
“We understand the critical nature of our services, and the health of our communities remains our top priority. We remain in direct communication with our hospital partners and are implementing workarounds to help restore services and fulfill orders,” the organization wrote in its incident report. “Your support means everything to us.”
Investigations are ongoing.
