SickKids responding to cybersecurity incident affecting hospital phone lines

SickKids dealing with cyber security incident SickKids hospital in Toronto says it's responding to a cyber security incident that is affecting network systems such as phone lines.

The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids) says it’s currently responding to a “cybersecurity incident” that is affecting several of its network systems, including phone lines, causing the hospital to call a “code grey,” which means system failure.

The code went into affect at 9:30 p.m. on Sunday and is ongoing as of Monday night.

“The safety and well-being of our patients and their families is our top priority,” SickKids said in a release on Monday.

“All patient care is continuing and there is currently no evidence that personal information or personal health information has been impacted.”

SickKids says that upon learning of the incident, the hospital immediately activated the incident management command centre and launched an investigation.

The nature and scope of the incident have not yet been determined.

“At this time, the incident appears to have only impacted a few internal clinical and corporate systems, as well as some hospital phone lines and webpages,” the release went on to say.

“Downtime procedures have been activated where needed.”

SickKids says it has notified its government and hospital partners and has “engaged with expert third parties to resolve the incident as soon as possible.”

The hospital says that for the time being, people may experience difficulties calling SickKids or accessing certain webpages.

“We appreciate the patience and understanding of patients and families as clinical teams transition to downtime procedures in order to ensure that patient care remains unaffected,” the release said.