Computer viruses and malware 'rampant' in medical tech

[Hum]

High-risk medical technology has been found to be infected by computer viruses and malware, health and security experts have said.

They fear that the virus infections could become so severe that a patient may end up getting harmed.

Out-dated computer systems which were not able to be changed were to blame for the vulnerabilities, the experts said.

One US hospital is said to be deleting viruses from up to two machines a week.

The warnings were given as part of a panel discussion in Washington DC, as reported by Technology Review from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Mark Olsen, chief information security officer at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, said the hospital had 664 pieces of medical equipment running on old versions of Windows.

This means the equipment is affected by weaknesses which later releases of Windows have since fixed.

Kevin Fu, a leading expert in medical technology, explained that the machines were not updated because of fears that doing so would mean they were in breach of regulations put in place by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The FDA approve the use of technology by testing safety rather than security - meaning any potential exposure to cyberthreats is not considered.

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[Growled Member]

Kevin Fu, a leading expert in medical technology, explained that the machines were not updated because of fears that doing so would mean they were in breach of regulations put in place by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

Once again the government is the problem.

[Praetor]

this does not surprise me at all; like the article said it's more important to have the diag machines work with all the regulations then having then secure; it's amazing the amount of malware one can find in a single computer or expensive diag machine in a hospital, for example.