Security News > 2021 > January > Medical Device Security: Diagnosis Critical

Sadly, concerns about medical device IT security are a healthcare reality.

Ripple20 for instance is a group of bugs found in June 2020, plaguing 53,000 medical device models.

"Maybe you put ransomware on my computer. That's bad. But if you have malware on a medical device that a patient hooked up to, there is tremendous, wide-open risk to human life."

"The coronavirus isn't creating more vulnerabilities in medical devices, it's laid bare the problems that already exist," said Tim Erlin, vice president of product management and strategy at Tripwire.

Because of strict FDA guidelines over device configuration and legally-binding vendor support contracts, patient-care facilities often must rely on slow-to-move vendors for patching, upgrades and replacements - a rare and expensive process.

Suggestions for locking down IoMT devices include assessing a device's exposure to the internet, disabling unnecessary or unused services on devices and segmenting critical networks by IoT-device needs.

News URL

https://threatpost.com/medical-device-security/163127/