2 held for modifying power meters to run bitcoin mines in Surat Thani
Police track down suspects after Provincial Electricity Authority finds it has been defrauded out of approximately 10 million baht thanks to the tampering of meters in nine locations
Two men have been arrested for allegedly modifying their power meters to make running their nine bitcoin mines in Surat Thani much cheaper, police announced on Tuesday.
Crime Suppression Division (CSD) commander Pol Maj-General Montree Thetkhan and representatives of the Provincial Electricity Authority (PEA) held a joint conference at the CSD head office to announce the arrests.
The suspects were identified as Nattapong and Arthit, both 30 years old, and were charged with unlawfully modifying PEA meters and causing up to 10 million baht in lost revenue.
Montree explained that the mines were powered by solar panels during the day, but used electricity from the PEA grid at night.
However, the meters were modified to register the use of far fewer units of electricity than actually used.
He said police and PEA officials seized 111 bitcoin mining machines, seven desktop computers, 10 internet routers and 10 modified electricity meters from nine houses in Surat Thani. This was part of an operation to shut down illegal bitcoin mines.
Montree said the police and PEA had jointly been conducting investigations for several months before zeroing in on the nine houses last Thursday and making the arrests.
He added that the CSD had received a tip-off in September that a shophouse in Surat Thani rented by a young man was being used for the operation of a call centre. Suspicions were raised when security cameras were spotted around the house.
Montree said police found that the shophouse was being rented by Nattapong and that he had rented six other shophouses and two detached houses in Surat Thani. Police said none of the houses had any real residents.
The CSD also found evidence of transactions worth more than 40 million baht in Nattapong’s bank accounts between January 2023 and July 2024. Hence, police said, there was reason to believe he had been carrying out illegal activities.
The CSD alerted the PEA to check the nine houses and found that they used a lot of power, even though nobody was living there.
So, CSD obtained a search warrant from the Surat Thani Provincial Court on November 7 and raided the houses to find they were being used as bitcoin mine locations. Police then acquired arrest warrants to detain the two suspects soon after.
Nattapong has reportedly admitted to hiring Arthit to modify the power meters to record lower usage of the electricity bills.
The PEA measured the actual electricity used in the nine houses and estimated the total to be about 1 million baht per month. It is estimated that Nattapong cheated the PEA out of at least 10 million baht during his yearlong bitcoin mining operation.
Bitcoin mining is an energy-intensive process involving mining devices and software that competes to solve a cryptographic problem. The mining process also confirms transactions to the cryptocurrency’s network, and miners who win the competition are awarded a bitcoin. The cryptocurrency was worth more than 3 million baht on Tuesday.
