Since Bitcoin’s commencement in 2009, and the subsequent cryptocurrencies, have created controversy. Across the globe, a lot of countries are endeavoring to develop rules as well as regulations to cover cryptocurrencies.
In the case of Iran, though the government allows the regulated mining of crypto, the officials executed a clampdown on the illegal crypto mining in the previous year to eliminate stress on the energy supply of the country. The government in Iran wants to have a unique series of legislation implemented to enhance the punishment for the utilization of illegitimate mining of Bitcoin.
Iranian authorities clampdown illegitimate crypto miners
The new legislation of the Islamic republic, as per a senior official from Tavanir (the country’s Power Generation, Distribution, and Transmission Company), will take into account imprisoning infringers as well as revoking business certifications. As per the Tehran Times, referring to IRNA (a news agency run by the state), it was stated on the behalf of Mohammad Khodadadi Bohlouli that elevated punishments include enhancing the offenders as well as revoking their business certifications if they repeat violations.
Power shortages
The official mentioned that the misusing subsidized energy for crypto mining worsens the quality of the electricity supplied on the national scale along with destroying the electrical appliances of people like air conditioners, refrigerators, and televisions. Khodadadi added that it is illegitimate to mine crypto by utilizing subsidized power allocated for commercial, agricultural, industrial, as well as home-based appliances.
Iran prohibited crypto mining in the previous year’s late May for just five months as included in the measures of the country to minimize the power shortage frequency, which the officials attribute to the swelling energy demand during the dry and hot summer. Bitcoin as well as the rest of cryptos are manufactured through a procedure known as mining, where powerful series of computers compete in solving complex mathematical puzzles.
The procedure consumes a substantial amount of power from fossil fuels that are in abundance across Iran. In 2019, the mining of Bitcoin was approved by the government of Iran, however just for industrial targets. The respective ruling witnessed a considerable spike in mining across the country. Afterward in 2020, the officials released up to 1,000 devices for crypto mining.
A prominent BTC mining center
Elliptic (a blockchain analytics company), in its research, pointed out that Iran is responsible for nearly 4.5% of the cumulative BTC mining all around the world, making several hundred million dollars worth in crypto revenue to be used to eliminate the influence of the sanctions imposed by the United States.
