Thieves Steal 600 Powerful Bitcoin-Mining Computers in Huge Heist

Megalith

Megalith

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Hundreds of servers designed to mine bitcoin have been stolen in Iceland, and authorities have been unable to track down a single system. The missing hardware includes 600 graphics cards, as well as 100 processors, 100 power supplies, 100 motherboards, and 100 sets of computer memory. Law enforcement is hoping for an energy surge somewhere, as they appear to be out of leads.

"This is a grand theft on a scale unseen before," Police Commissioner Olafur Helgi Kjartansson said, according to the AP. "Everything points to this being a highly organized crime." The AP reports that police are tracking energy consumption across Iceland in case the thieves turn on their new computers and place a strain on the grid, since that could potentially lead them back to the stolen computers' location.
 
If it was organized enough to stump the police, I imagine they're not just going to plug everything in somewhere else in Iceland and get caught that way.
 
Kinda sounds like an inside job. I'd imagine those servers would be under security and running 24/7. How can someone just collect 100 rigs without anyone noticing? :cautious:
 
with radeon cards being so rare, even if they try to sell them it would be easy to spot
 
sfsuphysics said:
Why sell when you probably can mine with them and make way more money in the long run.
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Because... it's stolen?

Or maybe you're right and the Icelandic Thieves Guild is starting up a retirement fund for it's members.
 
Darkswordz said:
Kinda sounds like an inside job. I'd imagine those servers would be under security and running 24/7. How can someone just collect 100 rigs without anyone noticing? :cautious:
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That, and these are ASICs so they are unprofitable / unsellable at a certain point.

Which units were these?

10 bucks says it was an inside job and done to offload a bunch of crap and claim insurance losses.
 
"Law enforcement is hoping for an energy surge somewhere,"
The gamers have finally said "Enough is enough". Not being able to buy your card of choice at a reasonable price is enough to cause many gamers to go insane. This is true desperation.;)
 
Darkswordz said:
Kinda sounds like an inside job. I'd imagine those servers would be under security and running 24/7. How can someone just collect 100 rigs without anyone noticing? :cautious:
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The thefts, which occured between late December and early January, were reportedly captured on surveillance cameras by Advania, the server company hit by two of the three thefts. (The graphics cards, processors and so on were allegedly stolen from a home.) Advania had been offering its customers access to bitcoin-mining rigs, and it sounds like those were the type that were stolen. The Associated Press reports that the stolen computers are worth nearly $2 million."
 
damn that's messed up. maybe an inside job? although it's no secret Iceland is home to some large players and it's a small country.
 
If they were ASIC boxes the cops might have a shot of nabbing them ... but regular PC /server parts? Ha good luck with that.
 
They should start looking at recent large purchases of solar panels/equipment. These guys were too smart to just plug all these things to the grid once they got them.
 
PsyKo[H] said:
They should start looking at recent large purchases of solar panels/equipment. These guys were too smart to just plug all these things to the grid once they got them.
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Iceland isn't exactly a great location for rolling out solar farms. Wind power might be a possibility, but with all of Iceland's cheap geothermal energy, anyone building any non-geo power plant would raise some red flags.
 
After they have announced plans to look for energy spikes ... good luck
 
Bitcoin mining? Modern computers can't mine Bitcoin effectively at all. A few ASIC machines would outperform all that was said to be stolen, if they were in fact mining Bitcoin. Alt coins, however, that stuff could mine. Why is HardOCP continually getting the news about cryptocurrency wrong, or only posting negative stuff about it?
 
JerRatt said:
Bitcoin mining? Modern computers can't mine Bitcoin effectively at all. A few ASIC machines would outperform all that was said to be stolen, if they were in fact mining Bitcoin. Alt coins, however, that stuff could mine. Why is HardOCP continually getting the news about cryptocurrency wrong, or only posting negative stuff about it?
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I'm sure they said "Bitcoin" as that is the only thing the public understands.

It's like every shooting is either: AK47, AR15 or Glock. That's all the world understands.

Likely those parts are already on another countries power grid, so the idea of looking for them in Iceland is futile.
 
Hell if the video cards were halfway decent, they could ebay / craigslist them and make $$$ given how much the card market is right now.
 
Rumor has it these Robin Hoods will be almost giving away the cards @ MSRP, making local retailers very angry.
 
600 gpus and 100 processors and 100 sets of memory...

Sounds like 100 x 6gpu mining rigs
 
Eickst said:
600 gpus and 100 processors and 100 sets of memory...

Sounds like 100 x 6gpu mining rigs
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yesjacknicholson.gif
 
Maple syrup heists in Canada, crypto hardware heists in Iceland. It makes a lot of sense.
 
Article should have said crypto currency mining computers. I very much doubt these systems were used to mine bitcoins.
 
Darkswordz said:
Kinda sounds like an inside job. I'd imagine those servers would be under security and running 24/7. How can someone just collect 100 rigs without anyone noticing? :cautious:
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Given Iceland's population density, it's probably family members taking care of business
 
Computer heists? Are we going to finally admit this crypto fad is getting out of hand?

What's next, kids sticking up other kids for their GPUs in the streets?
 
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