Medibank set for system-wide weekend shutdown

Customers of Australia’s largest health insurer will be unable to access its facilities, with the company forced to take action following the recent attack on its data.

Millions of customers will be unable to use their health insurance this weekend, with Medibank set to shut down its systems in the wake of a huge cyber attack.

Medibank is set to shut down its IT systems, retail stores and customer contact centres this weekend as it overhauls its online security.

“Operation Safeguard” will see systems shutdown from 8:30pm on Friday, with the insurer claiming it expects things to be back up and running on Sunday “at the latest”.

Medibank’s retail stores, website, app and customer call centres will be unavailable over the weekend. Customers also won’t be able to do on the spot claiming for any health services amid the shutdown. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Tertius Pickard

Customers won’t be able to access Medibank and ahm services through the website or app and HICAPS won’t be available for on the spot claiming.

Medibank’s retail stores and its customer call centre will also be closed on Saturday.

The move comes after Russian hackers breached the customer database of Australia’s biggest health insurer, obtaining the personal information and health records of almost 10 million current and former customers.

The cyber criminals released the data online after Medibank refused to pay a $15 million ransom, with customer information about abortion, drug and alcohol abuse and mental health disorders made public on the dark web.

The insurer issued an apology to customers over the incident and said the shutdown work was vital to ensure the incident didn’t happen again

“We apologise for the inconvenience this operation may cause customers, but this is the next necessary phase of our ongoing work to further safeguard our network,” a Medibank spokesperson said.

The move comes after Russian hackers breached the customer database of Australia’s biggest health insurer, obtaining the personal information and health records of almost 10 million current and former customers. Picture NCA NewsWire / Ian Currie

“Since the cybercrime we have bolstered existing monitoring, added further detection and forensics capability across the Medibank system and network and have scaled up analytical support via specialist third parties.”

Microsoft IT security experts will oversee the operation from headquarters in Melbourne, with the move planned for the last several weeks “given the complexity of the maintenance activities and the requirement to take our systems offline”.