NHS digital has come under fire from computer security professionals; as an investigation into yesterday’s Malware virus has revealed NHS used McAfee and hadn’t updated it in seven years.
“Honestly, bloody McAfee?” Said digital security expert Mike Boyle of Rochdale.
“You’d think the principle health organisation of the nation would have better firewalls and security than McAfee, it turns out they hadn’t updated it in seven years.”
It appears the head of NHS digital simply kept clicking “remind me later” when the basic home computer security software notified him of updates.
“I’ve clicked remind me later every day for at least six years. You just don’t expect to need to update your virus software this frequently I suppose.”
Yesterday’s malware attack affected NHS computer systems all over the northwest. The Herald asked George Crippin, head of the NHS Greater Manchester trust digital security, whether he knew how the system was infected; he said
“We regularly have to deal with Malware; turns out this time some pillock opened a ‘Barclayzs Banck’ email and it all went South from there.”
