Restoration Of Change Healthcare Payments, Claims Planned For Coming Weeks: UnitedHealth

The insurance giant is continuing to work to restore its systems following disruption from the widely felt February ransomware attack.

UnitedHealth Group expects to have its IT systems restored starting in mid-March following the widely felt ransomware attack against Change Healthcare in February.

In a statement Thursday evening, UnitedHealth said that the Change Healthcare electronic prescribing system “is now fully functional with claim submission and payment transmission also available as of today.”

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Next up will be the restoration of the Change Healthcare payment platform. Electronic payment functionality “will be available for connection” starting March 15, according to the UnitedHealth statement.

As for Change Healthcare medical claims, “we expect to begin testing and re-establish connectivity to our claims network and software on March 18, restoring service through that week,” UnitedHealth said.

If the timeline proves to be accurate, the disruptions from the attack will end up having lasted a month in total. UnitedHealth disclosed the incident in a Feb. 22 filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

The attack has prevented some U.S.-based pharmacies and hospitals, as well as other health-care facilities and offices, from processing claims and receiving payments.

The Russian-speaking cybercriminal gang known as AlphV and Blackcat claimed responsibility and said on its darkweb site that it exfiltrated 6 TB of data in the attack against Change Healthcare, a unit of UnitedHealth’s Optum subsidiary. UnitedHealth later confirmed that cybercriminals were behind attack.

Security researchers shared evidence suggesting UnitedHealth paid the cybercriminals a $22 million ransom to regain access to its systems. The insurance giant has declined to comment on the reports.

In its statement Thursday, UnitedHealth Group CEO Andrew Witty said the company is “determined to make this right as fast as possible.”

There continues to be “no indication that any other UnitedHealth Group systems have been affected by this attack,” the company added.