Over the past three years, illegal Russian crypto mining operations have been quietly stealing electricity, that is now being estimated to 450 million rubles, equal to $6.6 million, approximately. This is the latest report of the state owned Rosetti power grid operator.

The government owned grid operator revealed that a big number of Russian businesses run backdoor illicit mining operations. These mining processes were being handled in offices, factories, remote locations like farms and even underground fores locations, having no contract with local power distributors, making these procedures completely illegal.

Rosetti claims that many of these businesses were hooked to the closest power lines with no permission, and proceeded to steal electricity. Seeing the size of Russia' s territory, one is not surprised that these operations have been going on undisturbed for a long time.

Over the last three years, Rosseti has found 35 illegal crypto mining locations across dozens of regions around the country, which proves how wide spread this practice really is in a country like Russia.

Russia has been considering a total ban on cryptocurrencies and all associated activities. However, this is proving to be more difficult that expected, seeing the constant surges of crypto coin prices.

However, Russia is far from being the only nation whose illegal mining activities are a nuisance to the local government. Fore instance, just last year a crackdown on unauthorized Chinese BTC mining operations resulted in 7000 detained miners.