Hacking

COVID-19 vaccine manufacturer suffers a data breach

Dr. Reddy’s, the Indian contractor for Russia’s “Sputinik V” COVID-19 vaccine was hit with a cyber-attack that forced the company to close its plants.

Indian COVID-19 vaccine manufacturer Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories was hit with a cyber attack that forced it to shut down its plants in Brazil, India, Russia, the U.K., and the U.S..

According to The Economic Times the company suffered a data breach.

The Indian company is the contractor for Russia’s “Sputinik V” COVID-19 vaccine, recently the Drug Control General of India (DCGI) gave it the authorization to enter Phase 2 human trials.

According to the BBC, the phone lines at the company’s UK sites in Cambridgeshire and Yorkshire were down.

In response to the security breach, the COVID-19 vaccine manufacturer has isolated all data center services.

“In the wake of a detected cyber-attack, we have isolated all data center services to take required preventive actions,” CIO Mukesh Rathi said in a media statement. “We are anticipating all services to be up within 24 hours, and we do not foresee any major impact on our operations due to this incident.”

According to the media, the attack is likely the result of a cyber espionage operation aimed at stealing info on the COVID-19 vaccine development.

At the time it is not clear whether the attack was carried out by a nation-state actor or a cyber crime gang.

In July, the British National Cyber Security Centre revealed that Russia-linked group APT29 is conducting cyberespionage campaigns targeting UK, US, and Canadian organizations working of the development of a COVID-19 vaccine.

In the same period, the US Justice Department accused two Chinese hackers of stealing trade secrets from companies worldwide and recently involved in attacks against firms developing a vaccine for the COVID-19.

In September, the El Pais newspaper reported that Chinese hackers have stolen information from Spanish laboratories working on a vaccine for COVID19.

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Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – hacking, COVID-19)

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Pierluigi Paganini

Pierluigi Paganini is member of the ENISA (European Union Agency for Network and Information Security) Threat Landscape Stakeholder Group and Cyber G7 Group, he is also a Security Evangelist, Security Analyst and Freelance Writer. Editor-in-Chief at "Cyber Defense Magazine", Pierluigi is a cyber security expert with over 20 years experience in the field, he is Certified Ethical Hacker at EC Council in London. The passion for writing and a strong belief that security is founded on sharing and awareness led Pierluigi to find the security blog "Security Affairs" recently named a Top National Security Resource for US. Pierluigi is a member of the "The Hacker News" team and he is a writer for some major publications in the field such as Cyber War Zone, ICTTF, Infosec Island, Infosec Institute, The Hacker News Magazine and for many other Security magazines. Author of the Books "The Deep Dark Web" and “Digital Virtual Currency and Bitcoin”.

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