In reply to mark.

The Abbott St Jude Medical is not alone in the risks posed by its cardiac rhythm management products as you rightly point out Mark. Since 2011 there have been a number of medical devices from a wide array of manufacturers that have been found to have major security risks right the way up to being used as unexpected execution tools.

While better security governance in the design, coding, testing and manufacturing of new medical devices is a must, so too is ongoing vulnerability assessment and patching of all devices - including ones that are 15 or 20 years old and still in service. Manufacturers have a duty of care to test and provide ongoing support and updates to security vulnerabilities discovered in their devices - but right now I don't see much evidence of that.