Power outages in the Guizhou and Xinjiang regions of China have reportedly triggered “strict” inspections at local cryptocurrency mines, Cong Express reports.
Mine owners say their facilities have been closed since November 5th, when a process of “rectification” was initiated by local authorities.
Xinjiang is located in northwestern China and is home to the Uyghur minority group.
According to CNN, the Chinese government, “has been waging unrelenting campaigns against what it calls the forces of ‘terrorism, separatism and religious extremism,’ in the resource-rich area.
Omer Kanat, the Director of the Uyghur Human Rights Project says, “More than one million Uyghurs are being kept in…so-called re-education camps, and the first thing they are forced to do in these camps is to renounce Islam.”
In July, cryptominers displaced by calamitous flooding in Sichuan province said they were heading for Xinjiang to set up shop.
Mines report that they have, “…lost about 1 million capacity per day during the rectification period,” as representatives from the Chinese state conduct tax inspections and verify the real names of all people- both producers and customers- involved with the operations.
One miner was also required to sign a “guarantee book,” that states:
“According to the needs of the public security department’s network information security work, in the future, our company will implement higher standards for the company’s business real name system…”
One miner who claimed that the real impact of his industry on the local power grid was, “still relatively small,” says he has been ordered by Xinjiang authorities to relocate or curtail power.
He said he expects more mines to be affected by the rectification in the future.
It is understood that the mines will be allowed to reopen once, “licenses, state-of-the-art power supply procedures, and employee social security are officially complete,” but as of November 11th, the mines were still closed.