Clinical Diagnostics paid ransom to solve recent data breach, sources claim

Clinical Diagnostics, the laboratory that recently suffered a data breach involving sensitive information of over half a million participants in a health screening, has paid a ransom to the criminals responsible for the incident.

The research laboratory won’t officially confirm that a ransom was paid to the attackers. However, the research facility is hinting that some sort of payment did take place.

“We currently have no indication that the attacker will proceed to leak the copied data, but we are, of course, monitoring the situation closely,” the company’s website says, indicating that a ransom was actually paid to prevent the stolen data from being published on or sold via the dark web.

In addition, two separate sources told RTL Nieuws that money has been paid to the attackers: a Clinical Diagnostics employee who wishes to remain anonymous and ransomware operation Nova, the group of cybercriminals responsible for the data breach.

Neither can say how much ransom was paid. According to the Dutch news outlet, the attackers have reportedly demanded millions of euros in ransom.

On Monday, the Centre for Population Screening, an institution that conducts healthcare studies on behalf of the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM), disclosed that personal and sensitive information of 485,000 participants in a cervical cancer screening program had been stolen between July 3rd and July 6th, 2025.

The attackers managed to exfiltrate names, addresses, dates of birth, citizens’ service numbers (BSN), test results, and the names of the participants’ healthcare providers from an external research lab.

Z-CERT, the Computer Emergency Response Team for the healthcare sector in the Netherlands, confirmed that the data breach also infected several other healthcare providers, including general practitioners and hospitals.

Clinical Diagnostics has declined to disclose the total number of people affected by the data breach.

“We do not make public statements about that. All affected individuals will be informed personally by letter in the coming weeks,” a spokesperson told RTL Nieuws.