September 4, 2017.
The pacemakers of the American manufacturer Abbott suffer from a security flaw and are potentially hackable. An update flaw that should be quickly resolved.
Pacemakers manufactured by St. Jude Medical
A team of researchers from the University of Louvain, Belgium, has made an astonishing discovery. They revealed that pacemakers manufactured by St. Jude Medical, a company acquired by Abbott, could be hacked. Malicious people could indeed control the rhythm or drain the battery of these devices which are intended for people with bradycardia, that is to say who have a too slow heartbeat.
This discovery prompted the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the highest American health authority, to ask the health professionals concerned and the carriers of these pacemakers to update their devices. In total, nearly 460,000 pacemakers could be affected by this security defect. ” This update will be launched in France after local validation », Assured the company Abbott to our colleagues at the OBS.
Risk of rapid battery exhaustion
According to the FDA, if these security holes were exploited, they could “ allow an unauthorized user – i.e. other than the physician – to access the device using commercially available equipment “. And to add that ” this access could be used to modify programming commands on the implanted pacemaker, which could result in harm to the patient “.
The risk is indeed significant enough to be reported. Patients with the following devices should therefore contact their physician: Accent SR RF ™, Accent MRI ™, Assurity ™, Assurity MRI ™, Accent DR RF ™, Anthem RF ™, Allure RF ™, Allure Quadra RF ™, and Quadra Allure MP RF ™. However, it is not necessary to change the pacemaker, a simple update is enough.
Marine Rondot
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