Chasing Alleged Drug Trafficker Leads Brazilian Authorities To A Hidden Crypto Mining Facility

The police in Brazil have nabbed a man for allegedly having run an illegal drug lab and then using the top crypto Bitcoin (BTC) to launder the revenue and profits he made off his unscrupulous enterprise.

This is not the first time that the role of cryptocurrencies has been observed in an illegal activity and this arrest is expected to only fuel the standpoint of those who believe that crypto can be used liberally for crime owing to its private and sometimes anonymous character.

According to reports, officials from the State Department of Drug Trafficking in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, were chasing a suspected drug trafficker when they happened to come across a hidden Bitcoin mining facility. The entire thing transpired on the 23rd of April and marked a really shocking thing for the small area in which it occurred.

Reaching the site where the alleged drug trafficker was running a Bitcoin mining facility, the officials from the Drug Trafficking department found 25 machines meant for mining cryptocurrencies all day, as well as software and hardware of excellent quality and a high degree of advancement. All these equipments have been estimated to have an approximate value of 250,000 reals or 63000 dollars.

The police stated that the person who was apparently responsible for all the equipment in this facility claimed to have rented out the space for mining Bitcoin as a form of investing in it as an asset. The man has been fined for using electric power illegally to run the facility.

The man’s connection to the drug trafficking incident and the role of Bitcoin in laundering the profits from the same are currently being investigated.

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