A veteran government employee has been arrested on charges of illegally engaging in crypto mining using work equipment. The man allegedly cost the New York State government up to $6,000 over his activities and could be jailed for as long as 15 years in connection with his crimes. Christopher Naples was an information technology supervisor at the country clerk’s office in Suffolk County, which he has held for the past two decades.
Naples allegedly set up 46 devices for his block reward mining.
According to a report by AP News, Naples allegedly set up 46 devices for his block reward mining throughout the county center in Riverhead, New York. He reportedly placed his mining equipment in locations that couldn’t be easily accessed, such as “an unused electrical wall panel or underneath floorboards,” AP News noted. Some of these devices have been operational since at least February 2021. The district attorney’s office began to investigate the 42-year-old after it received a tip. It installed surveillance cameras in the hallways of the building housing the clerk’s office, Newsday reports.
Naples had been complaining about a slow internet connection.
Before the investigation unearthed his crimes, county employees working in the same building as Naples had been complaining about slow internet connection and unpleasant air conditioning. “Within hours of the devices being shut down, the temperature in the room dropped 20 degrees. So not only was this operation being paid for with thousands of dollars of taxpayer money, but it also put the County’s infrastructure at risk,” Timothy Sini, the Suffolk County District Attorney, revealed. Last Wednesday, he turned himself in to authorities and was charged with public corruption, grand larceny, official misconduct, and computer trespassing.
