A U.S. health network, operating 140 hospitals across 19 states and the District of Columbia, took weeks to recover from a ransomware attack.
Medical staff recalled the situation inside their ward:
“It’s putting patients’ lives in danger. People have too many patients for what is safe. Nurses are taking on five or six patients, dealing with all of this paper charting. It’s frightening how many safety guardrails have been out of service without any computers.”
Everything you do, hour by hour, depends on vital and interconnected services.
Compromised technology is only the beginning—the harm from cyberattacks reaches people, often the most vulnerable.
The fallout ripples through communities. A single event can cancel surgeries, cut power, empty shelves, silence phone lines, and ground flights.
As the number of victims rises, one question demands an answer: what does a cyberattack really cost society?
What We Do
Critical Cyber is a public interest organization documenting the human cost of cyberattacks.
We give voice to victims and responders: the people who lived through an attack and the people who fought to stop one. Their accounts make the full cost undeniable—and the demand for accountability urgent.
Our work combines testimony, evidence, and expert collaboration to:
■ Collect and publish testimony across vital sectors.
■ Translate individual cases into a public record and evidence of harm.
■ Put survivors at the front of the reform process.
How We Do It
Stories
survivors first
We collect firsthand testimony across 10 vital sectors, structured to capture the incident, the disruption that follows, and what recovery, if it comes, actually looks like.
Outcome: a public record that did not exist before.
Frontlines
incident to pattern
We corroborate testimony with sector-level data and expert analysis, showing that individual harm is not anecdotal but systemic.
Outcome: an evidence base to support policy reform.
Reverse Design
reform from the ground up
We reverse the policy design: survivors identify where accountability breaks down, and their testimony shapes the reform that follows.
Outcome: proposals built by individuals who understand the cost.