Russian Hackers Target US Nuclear Research Institutes

Sat Jan 07 2023
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Monitoring Desk

ISLAMABAD/WASHINGTON: A Russian hacking group known as Cold River targeted three nuclear research institutes in the United States this past summer.

Hackers target US institutes

As per internet records showed the hackers created fake login pages for each institution and emailed nuclear scientists to force them to reveal their passwords. The hackers of Cold River targeted the Brookhaven (BNL), Argonne (ANL), and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories (LLNL) between August and September.

Since the invasion of Ukraine, cybersecurity experts and western government officials have warned that Cold River has intensified its hacking campaign against Kyiv’s allies. 

As UN specialists visited Russian-controlled Ukrainian territory to inspect Europe’s largest atomic power plant and evaluate the risk of what both sides feared could be a devastating radiation disaster amid intense shelling nearby, the digital attack on the US labs was under way, according to Ruters.

According to interviews with nine cybersecurity organizations, Cold River has been involved in dozens of additional high-profile hacking incidents in recent years. Cold River initially came to the attention of intelligence specialists after it attacked the British Foreign Office in 2016.

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