My weekly SuperValu grocery delivery is postponed until tomorrow, and I enjoyed sleeping in this morning. There has been a flurry of activity with regard to job interviews. My interview on Wednesday with Jigsaw (Ireland’s national youth mental health services agency) went well, although it’s a junior position for which I’m obviously overqualified. They have already invited me to have an informal follow-up call on Monday; it’s supposedly not a full 2nd interview, so I’m not sure what they want to discuss. This afternoon I had a 2nd interview with The Outhouse LGBT Centre. The Executive Director took part, in addition to the managing director and board member who conducted the 1st interview. It was short and sweet, less than 30 minutes, and they said I should hear back next week… I’m getting very positive vibes about it. I’ve also been invited to a 1st interview next Friday for another Finance Officer position at the University College Dublin, this time with the National Virus Reference Laboratory, which sounds very interesting.
For the rest of the day, I’ve been continuing to decompress after yesterday’s exam, catching up on email, and being lazy in general. The sunset is getting later and later… here’s a snapshot of Dame Street around 9:00pm:
The big headline in Ireland news today: a ransomware attack, described as ‘possibly the most significant’ cyber attack ever on the Irish State, has disrupted the national Health Services Executive. The attack was a “zero-day” threat, which means there was no previous experience of how to respond, and a ransom in bitcoin has been demanded. In response, the HSE shut down all its IT systems to contain the issue. The intention is to restart individual elements of the HSE’s IT system once they have been risk assessed and cleared, but the process is likely to continue into the weekend and possibly beyond. The HSE is working with police, the defence forces and third-party cybersecurity experts to respond to what it is calling an “internationally operated criminal operation” as opposed to an act of espionage by another country. It’s also been announced that the ransom will not be paid in line with Ireland’s policy.
In the meantime, the system shutdown has had ripple effects throughout the Irish medical system. Appointments today have gone forward as scheduled, but future appointments have been cancelled. The biggest concern is the impact to critical areas such as radiological and maternity services. The system for COVID-19 vaccinations has not been affected and such appointments are going ahead as planned, though the registration portal has been shut down. In addition, because general practitioners are affected, they cannot refer patients for testing.
I’ve been following the news about the ransomware attack on the Colonial pipeline in the U.S. And earlier this week, I received an email from the University of California about a data breach that included current/former employees’ personal information (including emails, addresses, and social security numbers). The escalating frequency and severity of cyber attacks is very troubling… especially since it seems like there is scarce hope that law enforcement agencies will be able to track down the perpetrators. We can only hope there are equally clever and smart people working for the “good guys,” and that these recent incidents will make funding cyber security efforts a higher priority.
Until next time….
