Exclusive: Russian hackers targeted U.S. nuclear scientists LONDON/WASHINGTON, Jan 6 (Reuters) - A Russian hacking team known as Cold River targeted three nuclear research laboratories in the United States this past summer, according to internet records reviewed by Reuters and five cyber security experts.The digital blitz against the U.S. labs occurred as U.N. experts entered Russian-controlled Ukrainian territory to inspect Europe's biggest atomic power plant and assess the risk of what both sides said could be a devastating radiation disaster amid heavy shelling nearby.That was just one of several 'hack and leak' operations last year by Russia-linked hackers in which confidential communications were made public in Britain, Poland and Latvia, according to cybersecurity experts and Eastern European security officials.The NGO-related hacking attempts occurred just before and after the October 18 launch of a report by a U.N. independent commission of enquiry that found Russian forces were responsible for the "vast majority" of human rights violations in the early weeks of the Ukraine war, which Russia has called a special military operation.In a blog post, SEKOIA.IO said that, based on its targeting of the NGOs, Cold River was seeking to contribute to "Russian intelligence collection about identified war crime-related evidence and/or international justice procedures.""