Australian government contractor gets trial for workplace mining

A contractor working for the Australian government has been charged after he was caught.cryptocurrency mining in the workplace.

Federal Police Press Release TuesdayAustralia (AFP) said an IT contractor in the suburbs of Sydney Killar has modified government computer systems for cryptocurrency mining. It is reported that he managed to earn more than 9,000 Australian dollars ($ 6,184).

The unnamed employee will appear in court on twoaccusations — unauthorized modification of data in order to disrupt the functions of the system and unauthorized modification of data with limited access. Last year, AFP officers seized a laptop, phone, staff ID cards and data files in a raid on a contractor's home.

Maximum Punishmentthe charges are 10 years and 2 years in prison, respectively. Chris Goldsmid, Acting Head of AFP and Operations Manager for Cybercrime, called the crime “very serious” and explained:

"Australian taxpayers trustgovernment officials to perform functions vital to our community with the utmost integrity. Any suspected criminal conduct that exploits this trust for personal gain will be investigated and those responsible — brought to justice."

This news adds to the series of cases whenemployees of various organizations have encountered problems due to cryptocurrency mining in the workplace. In 2017, a former U.S. Federal Reserve official was also fined $ 5,000 and sentenced to probation after he was caught mining bitcoin on a server owned by the U.S. Central Bank.

Last February, engineers at the Nuclear Centerin Sarov were detained for mining on a supercomputer. In November last year, directors of a Chinese school were expelled from the Communist Party for mining in the workplace. The school principal and his deputy installed 9 computers in the educational institution with a total value of $ 7,000 and using them extracted cryptocurrencies.

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