Polish police have uncovered a secret crypto mining operation at their headquarters in Warsaw, local media reported. An IT specialist accused of minting digital coins on police computers has been dismissed and the case has been handed over to the Prosecutor’s Office.
Polish Police Force Fires IT Specialist for Crypto Mining at Work
Officers from the Polish National Police have found what local media described as a crypto mining farm at the Policja headquarters in Warsaw. The mining operation was allegedly organized by an IT technician, a civilian employee of the law enforcement agency, tvn24.pl news portal reported quoting two independent sources.
The crypto miner used police computers that he upgraded with video cards and specialized software. Although the mining equipment has probably consumed a serious amount of electricity due to the energy-intensive coin minting process, the biggest worry is that records from the police database might have been leaked, one of the sources noted.
The computer network stores a lot of confidential information such as reports from collaborators and digital files. Police officials insist their database has not been compromised and no breaches of the internal Police Data Transmission Network have been detected so far.
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The IT specialist has been fired and the contract of another employee, whose role has not been revealed yet, will also be terminated. Inspector Mariusz Ciarka, a National Police Command (KGP) spokesman, confirmed to Gazeta Wyborcza that the crypto miner has been dismissed immediately. He also commented:
The device he used was not connected to any database, and the case largely concerns the theft of electricity consumed by the so-called ‘cryptocurrency mining.’
The Polish police representative added that the case has already been transferred to the District Prosecutor’s Office in Warsaw as the investigation continues in order to establish if a crime has been committed. Experts are now working to assess the losses for the police service in terms of the amount of electricity used to mine digital currencies.
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