DCH Healthcare Systems pays hacker to end ransomware attack

The DCH Hospital system in west central Alabama may be accepting new patients as soon as Monday after resolving a ransomware attack. The Associated Press and the Tuscaloosa News report the three-hospital network paid a ransom to a hacker over the weekend to get a key to unlock its system. Since the Tuesday attack, DCH hospitals in Tuscaloosa, Northport, and Fayette had to resort to paper medical records. The hospitals also had to stop taking all but the most critically ill patients. Everyone else was funneled to hospitals in Birmingham and Mississippi.