A cyber espionage campaign targeted at companies vital to the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines has been detected.

(Medcity News)

According to an alert issued by the US government and a research blog published by IBM, the hacking campaign started in September.

It targeted a range of organisations, including in government and across the energy and IT sectors, that are associated with the COVID-19 'cold supply' chain.

The cold chain is an essential part of distributing vaccines manufactured by Pfizer/BioNTech, approved in the UK on Tuesday, as the vaccine needs to be stored at -70C (-94F) to avoid spoiling before being administered.

Although it is not clear whether the sophisticated phishing emails were successful, IBM warned that the campaign bore "the potential hallmarks of nation-state tradecraft" rather than an attack by cyber criminals.

"Without a clear path to a cash-out, cyber criminals are unlikely to devote the time and resources required to execute such a calculated operation with so many interlinked and globally distributed targets," added IBM.

(Lupni.com/Sky News)