Russia has seized over 8,000 illegal cryptocurrency mining sites

According to DL News, the state-owned power company Irkutskenergosbyt in the Irkutsk region of Russia recently discovered over 8,000 suspected illegal cryptocurrency mining sites, which were disguised as chicken coops, greenhouses, forests, paper mills, and abandoned gas stations.

Since 2019, the company has filed 2,170 lawsuits against illegal miners, seeking a total compensation of $18.5 million. The courts have ruled fines amounting to about half of that total, and some cases have been settled out of court. Miners often disguise their activities as electric vehicle charging or agricultural electricity use, leading to power losses. In many regions of Russia, to ensure grid stability, licensed industrial mining sites have been shut down, and there are plans to use artificial intelligence tools to trace illegal mining.