Crypto miners seized by Ukrainian authorities from nuclear power plant

• A criminal proceeding has been initiated regarding suspecting data leakage.
• The power plant was enlisted as a state secret.

Ukrainian law enforcement has recently exposed and seized numerous cryptocurrency mining equipment from a power plant owned by the state. Internetua – a local news agency – reported that the pieces of computer equipment were found during a raid by the Security Service of Ukraine. The raid took place at one of the offices located in the administrative wing of the South Ukrainian Nuclear Power Plant.

The confiscated pieces of equipment include six Radeon RX 470 GPU video cards, a motherboard, power supplies and extension cords, a USB and hard drive and cooling units that were installed at the power plant.

The power plant is managed by the state-owned Energoatom enterprise and is registered as a state secret, meaning no external computing devices are allowed within its premises. Local media affirmed that the authorities have already begun a criminal proceeding under the impression of any data leakage from the secure power plant.

Ukrainian security officers were examining the computers of the State Judicial Administration because of suspected infection via malware. The malware was created to steal computing power and secretly mine cryptocurrency.