The Strategy of Cybersecurity Against Cyberattacks Among the E.U (Part II.)
In part one of the article, we discussed the significance of cybersecurity healthcare inside Europe, and the extreme measures ENISA, the European Union Cyber Security Agency carry out. This part will examine the influence of the COVID-19 on cybersecurity healthcare and the even more crucial need in sturdy cybersecurity at this challenging time.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak and the new restrictions it brought upon us, healthcare systems that were already in the process of becoming more digitalized were propelled toward increased technology usage, working and administering with data "through the screens." This critical use of technology across the health care industry greatly inspired criminal hackers and cybersecurity had to become much more vigilant.
When social distancing became mandatory, governments across Europe and the World imposed lockdowns and new restrictions. As a result, the online world consequently became busier with more people working remotely, shopping online, and, of course, increased the eHealth services.
ENISA, the E.U. Agency for Cybersecurity, identified potential breaches for ill-disposed attack threats and understood the urgent need to reinforce cybersecurity on different platforms. They shared cybersecurity guidance and even prepared a video explaining to E.U. citizens how to safely use the Web to protect themselves from malicious cyber threats in these difficult times.
In early December 2020, the European Medicines Agency reported a cyberattack related to COVID-19 medicines and vaccination data, leaked through the Internet. The documentation concerning Pfizer and BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine was stored on the EMA server. The EMA did not share details regarding which documents or data were made available online. Still, they did admit that some of the stolen data were altered, compromising reports of the vaccine's reliability. The case is still under criminal investigation.
Against the background of high infection rates, the rising number of deaths due to the virus, and timely approval of the World Health Organization vaccine, the E.U. felt it urgent to start the European vaccination process; Bearing in mind that they did not agree to compromise on the importance of scientific evidence for the vaccine's safety and effectiveness.
This matter made the European Medicines Agency a significant target for cyber-attacks by hackers who aimed to undermine confidence in the vaccine's quality among the population. Even worse, they sought to accomplish this in part by spreading fake conspiracy theories through social media. The European Commission and UNESCO even published several informative infographics to cope with these conspiracy theories to combat such nefarious plots.
The E.U. battle against cyber-attacks will never end. Cyber-attacks and cybersecurity will continue to shadow each other in a vicious cycle, each advancing with cutting-edge technology, always trying to be one step ahead of the other.
