Ascension Cyberattack

On May 9, 2024, Ascension, a large Catholic health system headquartered in Missouri, announced to the media that on the prior day it “detected unusual activity on select technology network systems, which we now believe is due to a cybersecurity event.” At that time, Ascension was in the early stages of its investigation and remedial actions. Ascension has continued to provide updates since the announcement. The cybersecurity event resulted in various systems becoming unavailable, including the electronic health records system, some phone systems and certain other systems utilized to order certain tests, procedures and medications. The health system continues to work to re-establish system capabilities and take actions to further investigate and remediate the event.

This attack occurred on the heels of the Change Healthcare cyberattack that occurred in February of this year, which has had far-reaching consequences. UnitedHealth Group continues to respond to and mitigate that attack.