By Thai Newsroom Reporters
A BITCOIN MINING activity was today (May 1) found illegally operating at a disguised factory in Samut Sakhon, police said.
Seized in the police raid on the abandoned, unnamed ice-making factory in Tajin area of the capital district of Samut Sakhon were 690 computers and 17 mainframes allegedly used for the power-guzzling mining of Bitcoin, the world’s highest priced cryptocurrency, plus a 2,500-kVA power generator, the police said.
No suspected crypto miners were found in the police raid at the disguised factory where a lone Myanmar national had been hired as a guard.
The clandestine crypto mining activity, the compounded apparatus for which was calculated to combinedly cost no less than 70 million baht, had allegedly consumed as much as 10 million baht in electricity bills monthly.
Meanwhile, the Securities & Exchange Commission plans to block unlicensed crypto exchanges in Thailand after the Ministry of Digital Economy & Society endorses the proposed prohibition.
Nonetheless, the planned blockade is yet to take effect on a date to be publicly announced by the SEC which has been advising crypto investors to withdraw all funds for crypto investment from unregistered exchanges.
The SEC has cautioned those crypto investors who may have made transactions via unlicensed exchanges could possibly fall prey to unknown scammers or face money-laundering charges.
Largely anticipated to close down its unlicensed business in Thailand is Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange.
Other major exchanges including Coinbase, KuCoin and Kraken have not been found to be operating legally in this country, either.
CAPTION:
Cyber police raided two other cryptocurrency mining centres a few days earlier, the first one also in Samut Sakhon and the other Ratchaburi. Photo: Thai Rath
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