Hackers are threatening to publish before and after pictures of patients who have had surgery after vast amounts of data were stolen from a major cosmetic surgery chain, it has emerged.
The Transform Hospital Group suffered a ransomware attack and has reported the incident to the Information Commission.
The company, which has had numerous celebrity endorsements, has also written emails to its customers warning of the data security incident.
A hacker group known as REvil boasted on the darknet webpage of how it had obtained more than 900 gigabytes of patient photographs. The group said the intimate photos of customers were not a completely pleasant sight.
The Transform Hospital Group, also known as the Hospital Group, claims to be Britains leading weight loss and cosmetic surgery group.
It has 11 clinics specialising in breast enlargements, nipple corrections, nose adjustments and weight loss.
A spokesperson for Transform Hospital Group said: We can confirm that our IT systems have been subject to adata security breach.
None of our patients payment card details have been compromised but at this stage, we understand that some of our patients personal data may have been accessed.
We have alerted all of our patients to the incident and will be providing them with regular updates as the picture becomes clearer.
We have secured our systems and a full investigation is underway tounderstandthe extent of the incident. We are working with the National Cyber Security Centre, Information Commissioners Office, cyber security experts and the police to resolve the situation as quickly as possible.
It is understood that any images the hackers may have obtained would not include patients' faces as images are stored anonymously and show the body part treated, and so identifying an individual would not be possible.
The company has previously promoted itself via celebrity endorsements, although in recent years it has not done so.
Atomic Kitten singer Kerry Katona, Shameless actress Tina Malone and reality TV star Joey Essex from The Only Way is Essex are previous patients who have endorsed the clinic.
In an interview with the BBC, Simon Hails who had chest reduction surgery with the company, said: "I have had an email from The Hospital Group informing me of a 'data security incident' but no detail as to what has been hacked," he told the BBC.
"I'm obviously concerned as the last thing I want is 'before photos' being splattered around in the public domain. I've tried to keep my surgery private and not even some of my friends and colleagues know about it, so the data breach is concerning for me."
Ransomware is one of the more prolific forms of cyber attacks. It usually involves hackers gaining access to a computer network to obtain files.
Many victims of such attacks are encouraged not to pay ransoms to avoid fuelling the crime.
REvil, which is also known as Sodinokibi, has target numerous other companies.
Excerpt from:
Hackers threaten to post 'before and after' pictures of cosmetic surgery patients - Telegraph.co.uk
