Drones, Fake Bird Calls, and Shattered Glass Traps: Malaysia is Undergoing an Unprecedented "Bitcoin Crackdown"

Original Title: Bloomberg: Over a Billion in Stolen Electricity, Malaysia’s Bitcoin Mining Epidemic

Original Authors: Ryan Weeks, Kok Leong Chan, Netty Idayu Ismail, Bloomberg

Original Source:

Reposted by: Daisy, Mars Finance

In Malaysia’s hotspots for illegal cryptocurrency mining, enforcement operations begin from the air. Drones hover over rows of shoplots and abandoned houses, searching for abnormal heat sources—a typical signature of illicit mining machines in operation. On the ground, police use handheld sensors to check for irregular electricity usage. Sometimes, the approach is even more primitive: residents report strange bird calls, prompting police to discover that someone is deliberately playing nature sounds to mask the roaring noise of machines behind tightly closed doors.

These tools together form a mobile surveillance network, working full tilt to crack down on illegal Bitcoin mining.

In July 2024, an official inspects mining machines after a Bitcoin mining raid.

The targeted mining operations act with extreme caution: they frequently shift locations between vacant storefronts and abandoned houses, install insulation to mask the heat signature of running machines, and equip entrances and exits with CCTV, heavy security systems, and broken glass barriers to guard against intruders.

This is the cat-and-mouse game between Malaysian authorities and Bitcoin miners. Over the past five years, Malaysia has busted roughly 14,000 illegal mining sites. According to the Ministry of Energy, during the same period state-owned utility Tenaga Nasional (TNB) suffered losses of up to $1.1 billion from stolen electricity, and the situation is intensifying. In early October this year, as Bitcoin hit a new all-time high, authorities had already registered around 3,000 mining-related electricity theft cases.

Bitcoin hit a record $126,251 in October 2025, after which cryptocurrency prices fell sharply.

Now, Malaysia is stepping up enforcement. On November 19, the government established a cross-departmental special committee including the Ministry of Finance, Bank Negara Malaysia, and the national energy group. This task force will coordinate targeted crackdowns on illegal mining operators.

“The risks of allowing these activities go beyond electricity theft,” said Akmal Nasrullah Mohd Nasir, Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Energy Transition and Water Transformation and committee chair. “These activities could even damage our electricity infrastructure and pose serious challenges to the grid system.”

Bitcoin mining is essentially a computing power race: rows of specialized equipment perform trillions of calculations per second in hopes of successfully verifying transactions and earning Bitcoin rewards.

Bitcoin mining is big business. The global power consumption of Bitcoin mining now exceeds that of the entire countries of South Africa or Thailand. According to Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance, over 75% of Bitcoin mining is now concentrated in the United States. Malaysia’s share of the industry is less clear: as of January 2022, it accounted for 2.5% of global computing power, but Cambridge’s latest research has not released updated figures.

What is clear is that Malaysian miners are adept at repurposing all kinds of unusual venues for mining.

ElementX Shopping Mall, overlooking the Strait of Malacca, is a vast complex that was deserted during the COVID-19 pandemic and never recovered. Most of the mall still resembles a construction site, with exposed concrete floors and unshielded wiring. In early 2022, the mall welcomed a special tenant: Bitcoin miners. The mining machines operated there until early 2025, when a viral TikTok video exposed the operation, leading to their removal.

Hundreds of miles away in Sarawak, East Malaysia, similar covert mining sites exist. Bloomberg previously reported that a company called Bityou set up a mining farm at an old logging site. The company did not respond to requests for comment on this article.

In Malaysia, as long as operators obtain electricity legally and pay taxes, Bitcoin mining is considered a legal activity.

But Akmal disagrees. At the special committee’s first meeting on November 25, members discussed whether to recommend an outright ban on Bitcoin mining.

“Even if mining operations are compliant, the extreme volatility of the market is a major issue,” he noted. “In my view, there is currently no mining company that can be considered ‘legally and successfully operating’ in the true sense.”

He further stated that the sheer number of illegal Bitcoin mining sites and the operating patterns of those behind them indicate the involvement of organized crime.

“These activities are clearly controlled by criminal groups,” Akmal said. “Given how frequently mining machines are moved between different locations, their methods have become a fixed pattern.”