On March 11, Stryker, a medical technology company based out of Michigan with offices around the U.S. and the world, was cyberattacked by Handala, an Iranian based group. The attack wiped out nearly all of Stryker’s servers, clearing thousands of employees’ devices including laptops, cell phones, and others.

Handala’s goal was to cause disruption, not to gain leverage, so the attack simply wiped out Stryker’s servers. When the attack first occurred, some people were worried it would disrupt surgeries and other products manufactured by Stryker, but the disruption created was mainly internal. Manufacturing and shipping were impacted, but medical devices and patient safety were not.

More than a week later the company is still feeling the effects. Stryker is slowly moving back to production and shipping, but many devices and systems are still being repaired. Sophomore Travis O’Neil noted, “The severity of the attack is frightening. This is definitely over political conflict, and it’s scary what’s to come if Iran can wipe out a very large American company so easily.”

The cyber attack came just 12 days after the U.S. first launched air strikes on Iran, so Handala openly claiming credit for the attack makes it very likely that the attack is over the recent conflict. The goal of Handala’s attack was to send a message to the US, which they succeeded in doing. Threatening a large medical industry like Stryker put the US on edge because of the potential threat it posed to civilians in need of one of Stryker’s products.

Overall, the attack was a frightening blow to the major company, but as sophomore Ian Uiterwyck puts it, “Although the attack was terrible for the company and frightening for the country as a whole, it’s a good thing medical devices were not directly affected, because that would have caused major disruption.”