Busted Cryptominers Might Have Mined on 3,800 PS4 Consoles
The Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) on Thursday reported that Ukrainian law enforcement has pulled the plug on a clandestine cryptocurrency mining farm in the city of Vinnytsia. The perpetrators had set up camp in an old warehouse and stealthily tapped into the city's power grid to mine cryptocurrency. Most interestingly, the miners were caught with a shocking number of Playstation 4's. And pretty much everything else, too.
The Ukrainian authorities reportedly seized up to 5,000 pieces of hardware, including over 500 graphics cards, 50 processors and 3,800 PlayStation 4 (PS4) consoles, all of which are in short supply in the U.S. and beyond, as well as other tidbits.
[...] The photographs showed an endless list of racks with PS4s that are apparently connected to the internet. While we've seen pictures of alleged PS4 mining setups before, there has never been any concrete evidence that you can actually mine cryptocurrency on a gaming console. Although, after seeing a DIY project with a Game Boy mining Bitcoin, anything is possible. And the fact that the Ukrainian miners had so many PS4s does suggest that they may have found a way to mine with them.
[...] Hypothetically, the PS4 Pro could potentially come close to a Radeon RX 580 in Ethereum mining.
Also at Wccftech.
Previously: Cryptocurrency Miners Are Building Their Own Electricity Infrastructure
Massive bitcoin mine discovered in UK after police raid suspected cannabis farm
Clampdown on Crypto Mining Cuts China's GPU Prices Nearly 45 Percent
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Access to cheap electricity can make or break a cryptocurrency mining operation, and firms angling to strike it rich in an industry where delays can and will cost digital money will do just about anything to get it, as soon as they can.
The latest move in the quest for bargain-basement kilowatt hours, as quickly as possible: building out local power grids with bespoke electrical substations.
Canadian company DMG Blockchain is building what it hopes will be a fully-functioning substation near the Southern British Columbia town of Castlegar, which is electrified by hydro power. When I spoke to Steven Eliscu, who leads corporate development for DMG, over the phone, he told me that building the substation costs millions of dollars and required the company to build its own access road to haul equipment to the site. The goal: to plug it into the local grid and have it power DMG's expanded mining operations by September.
"At the end of August we'll go through a commissioning process where the utility will test everything as a completed substation and make sure that the town doesn't blow up when we flip the switch," Eliscu told me over the phone.
Source: MotherBoard
Clampdown On Crypto Mining Cuts China's GPU Prices Nearly 45 Percent:
China's non-stop effort to crack down on cryptocurrency mining farms has started to pay dividends. As the South China Morning Post reported today, graphics card pricing in the country has decreased substantially over the past few weeks. Following up on the South China Morning Post's tip, we've analyzed the historic pricing for various Ampere graphics cards. You can see the pricing trends in our breakdown below, but the clear takeaway is that pricing has receded as much as 45% since Beijing began pulling the plug on big mining farms around the country.
Besides being some of the best graphics cards for gaming, Nvidia's GeForce RTX 30-series (Ampere) cards are also very popular for cryptocurrency mining. It's impossible for us to look at pricing for every single Ampere model, so we randomly picked custom models from each tier to get a general idea of pricing behavior.
The price war is intense, so there's considerable pricing variation for the same graphics card model at different retailers. However, graphics card makers typically have their own online stores at major online retailers, such as Tmall, which is one of the biggest in China. We pulled the pricing from the official stores via Manmanbuy, a popular price tracker in China.
We observed a reduction in pricing up to 45% on some of Nvidia's latest graphics cards, such as the GeForce RTX 3060 — this mid-range Ampere card was one of the more popular models among mining farms in China. The higher-up models exhibited a smaller price reduction, though.
Ukraine warehouse packed with thousands of PS4s was actually a FIFA Ultimate Team bot farm:
A giant cryptocurrency farm in Ukraine that contained thousands of PlayStation 4 consoles was actually a FIFA bot farm.
Last week the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) announced it had shut down what was reported as a cryptocurrency mining farm that contained an incredible 3800 game consoles. Images showed racks of PS4 Slims (some claimed the photos showed PS4 Pros) - either way not the ideal hardware for a cryptocurrency farm.
It turns out the PS4s were being used to grind FIFA Ultimate Team.
According to an investigation by Ukraine business newspaper Delo, sparked by scepticism of the official claim about the farm being primarily about mining cryptocurrency, as well as the fact game discs can be seen protruding from PS4s in one of the pictures, what we're looking at in the photos is a bot farm that got stuck into the Ultimate Team grind, with the goal of selling accounts loaded up with in-game currency on the black market.
Delo said the Security Service of Ukraine has so far refused to comment on the revelation, citing the secrecy of the investigation. But the suggestion is these PS4 Slims, all controlled by PCs running bots, farmed Ultimate Team for profit.
Previously: Ukrainian Police Bust Cryptocurrency Mining Operation, Seize 3,800 PlayStation 4 Consoles.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 10 2021, @08:45PM (11 children)
Maybe I should try mining with it, since I don't use it much. I assume it would cost me more in electricity, at standard residential rates, than I'd get in any cryptocurrencies, though.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 10 2021, @08:58PM (10 children)
Most likely, which is why these guys were stealing power. That is the only real crime mentioned. That it was for crypto-mining instead of a grow op is merely incidental. At 140W each, 3800 PS4s would draw 532kW, and that wasn't all they had. They can't have been operating for very long since power companies tend to notice that kind of unbilled load.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Saturday July 10 2021, @10:57PM (6 children)
This. Heating your home by burning $100 bills in the fireplace is cheap and convenient as long as it's someone else's $100 bills.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 11 2021, @01:29AM (5 children)
That's an interesting thought. All the excess energy ends up as heat so you can create a crypto mining heater if you plan to use that energy on an electric heater regardless. Little to no additional energy needed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 11 2021, @01:39AM (2 children)
Next big invention, a crypto mining electric heater.
Heat up your room in those cold winters and make back some of the electrical cost of doing so at the same time with this crypto mining electrical heater!!! It contains many processors that mine for crypto and generate heat as the fans blow the excess hot air into your room keeping you warm!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 11 2021, @08:13AM (1 child)
wha..whe..who...wouldnt the energy you want for heating have all gone into the value of the coins? huh..?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 12 2021, @12:54AM
How does energy get transferred into the value of the coins?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 11 2021, @03:55AM
500kW would heat a sizable hydroponics facility.. Winter tomatoes anyone?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 11 2021, @04:59PM
Not just a thought. I've done it, and I'm sure countless others have as well. On cold nights, a card running at full burn easily generates enough heat to provide a decent amount of heating to a small room.
Although if you were living in an area where cold nights can't just be overcome by a blanket and sweater, then maybe not such a hot idea.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 10 2021, @11:57PM (1 child)
Well, since it's Jews doing the hoarding and stealing, they would have profited even without stealing electricity since they get the inside dibs on impending shortages and buy up everything they can for scalping.
Yes, that even included masks and PPE [justice.gov] from the start of the pandemic. From the link:
Coughing on FBI agents? Isn't that what lizards do in self defense, hiss and spit poison or something? Jews are such wretched goddamn animals, on so many levels.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 11 2021, @01:16AM
Fuck your stupid, shitty ass. How dumb are you? Plenty dumb.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday July 11 2021, @05:37PM
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Saturday July 10 2021, @08:58PM
Or... Most epic lan party ever.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 10 2021, @10:19PM
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 10 2021, @11:00PM (2 children)
Did they find Hunter Biden's laptop?
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 11 2021, @01:02AM
Flamebait? You Democrats sure are touchy on the subject of Hunter... whatcha hiding?
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 11 2021, @03:32AM
Crack Super Sleith Rudy G. is on the case! Best dick outside of any landscaping company!
(Score: 3, Touché) by Opportunist on Saturday July 10 2021, @11:06PM (2 children)
At least these miners didn't hoover up a bunch of graphics cards for that bullshit.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 11 2021, @03:58AM (1 child)
They only had 500. That was probably all they could get, which is why they went with PS4s.
(Score: 2) by Opportunist on Sunday July 11 2021, @09:01AM
Well then, a couple more busts like this and graphics card prices could come back to saner levels.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by looorg on Saturday July 10 2021, @11:49PM
Really? There is a shortage of the last generation consoles? I though the shortage or queue was for getting a PS5. Still even if the PS4 was in short supply in the western world I don't think 3800 of them would cover the shortage.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 11 2021, @12:07AM
"You know ... you're evil." - King Terry A. Davis (I wrote a fucking compiler)