UnitedHealth sees suspected nation-state cyberattack hit its Change Health unit
A UnitedHealth Group Inc.-owned business is experiencing a cyberattack that’s disrupting some operations, the company said Thursday.
UnitedHealth
UNH,
suspects that a “nation-state-associated cybersecurity threat actor” has obtained access to some of the information-technology systems operated by its Change Healthcare unit.
The company “is working diligently to restore those systems and resume normal operations as soon as possible, but cannot estimate the duration or extent of the disruption at this time,” it said in a Thursday filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
UnitedHealth currently deems the attack to be specific to Change Healthcare’s network, and other systems across the company are still operating properly.
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The company “proactively isolated the impacted systems from other connecting systems in the interest of protecting our partners and patients, to contain, assess and remediate the incident,” according to the filing.
At this time, UnitedHealth hasn’t determined whether the issue is “reasonably likely to materially impact” its financials. Shares slipped slightly in after-hours trading, after rising nearly 1% in regular trading.
UnitedHealth didn’t disclose the name of the suspected nation-state actor in its filing, but other companies have been hit recently by similar hacks.
Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co.
HPE,
said in late January that it believed Midnight Blizzard, a state-sponsored actor that’s also known as Cozy Bear, breached its corporate email systems.
Microsoft Corp.
MSFT,
also disclosed a hack by a Russian group last month, noting that the group was able to see “a very small percentage” of corporate email accounts after gaining a foothold in November.
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