There may have been 6000 hacking attempts in a single day, according to media sources.
Digital Desk: The activities of the hospital were halted for six days as a result of the cyberattack on the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) data, placing the vital information of millions of patients including VVIPs like previous prime ministers and lawmakers at risk.
Attempts were made to breach the data of the Indian Council of Medical Research just days after the cyber attack in New Delhi shocked the management of AIIMS and Safdarjung (ICMR). There may have been 6000 hacking attempts in a single day, according to media sources.
The government claimed that all attempts to access the ICMR files' data breach were unsuccessful, keeping the data secure, despite the fact that hundreds of attempts were made. The authorities added that the security firewall set up by the NIC had stopped the hacking attempts.
The claimed ransomware attack that allegedly crippled online systems at the AIIMS here was recently followed closely by hacking attempts. According to the officials, hackers who appeared to be from Hong Kong hit the Indian Council of Medical Research website 6000 times in a 24-hour period on November 30.
"The information on the ICMR website is secure. There was no downtime for the website." The firewall is from NIC and is updated frequently because the website is hosted at NIC Data Center. The firewall and security measures of NIC have successfully stopped the attack "explained the official.
Dr. Rajiv Bahl, Secretary of the Department of Health Research (DHR) and Director General of ICMR, evaluated the organization's cyber infrastructure and security procedures on December 2 in response to the hacking attempts, an official source stated.
"After a security examination by a CERT-IN appointed agency, it was disclosed that the ICMR website is hosted in the cloud at the National Informatics Centre (NIC). The NIC firewall and other security measures guard the website.
"Additionally, the ICMR internally hosts the online and data portals for a number of ICMR activities. A specialised open-source firewall guards the internal network (PFSense). Additionally, all active interfaces are frequently checked for any suspicious activity and inbound and outgoing internet traffic is closely regulated "added the insider.
The Secretary of DHR ordered that ICMR's cyber-infrastructure security, notably that of web portals and data, be improved in view of the recent attack on AIIMS and other medical facilities.
It was determined to transition the crucial online and data portals to Government Community Cloud in accordance with best practises (GCC). The source said that a request for proposals (RFP) for the purchase of GCC is currently in the final stages of preparation.
A proposal for developing an ICMR Data Centre (Delhi and Chennai) and a Disaster-Recovery site (Bangalore) is being developed on a turnkey basis. A network security audit of ICMR and various locations will be executed on an urgent basis, the source said.
(With inputs from PTI)
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