European hospitals targeted by ‘pro-Russian’ hackers

Several European hospitals are the target of pro-Russian hackers, according to the Dutch authorities.

The Netherlands’ National Cybersecurity Center (NCSC) said one of the country’s hospitals suffered a cyberattack over the weekend, pointing out that other European states supporting Ukraine have also been targeted.

The UMCG hospital in Groningen announced on Saturday that the website was taken offline on Saturday due to a cyber attack.

“Hospitals in Europe, including in the Netherlands, have most likely been targeted by the pro-Russian hacker group Killnet,” the NCSC said.

“This group announced DDoS attacks on hospitals, among others [in countries] help Ukraine,” it added.

In a denial of service (DDoS) attack, a target is inundated with connection requests, overwhelming and crashing computer systems.

However, the NCSC downplayed the importance of the attacks, saying they had “so far had moderate success and limited impact”.

Killnet is a hacktivist group that supports Russia. Probably founded in March 2022, it rose to prominence during the early months of the war in Ukraine and began a campaign of DDoS attacks and misinformation against Russia’s enemies.

The shadowy group says its main targets are supporters of Ukraine, including NATO countries and their allies.

Western intelligence agencies have in the past warned of Killnet attacks on critical infrastructure.

Hospitals in the UK, Germany, Poland, Scandinavia and the United States also said they were targeted.

Last week, the websites of German airports, government departments and the financial sector were attacked by the Killnet group.

The same group was linked to a DDoS attack on the European Parliament’s website in November shortly after it passed a resolution calling Russia a “state sponsor of terrorism”.