---
title: "Russia Punishes Guy Who Mined Bitcoin at Top-Secret Nuclear Lab"
description: "A nuclear engineer in Russia was just fined $7,000 for using his top-secret lab's supercomputer to illegally mine Bitcoin at work."
date: "2019-10-01"
modified: "2019-10-01"
authors:
  - name: "Dan Robitzski"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/danrobitzski"
url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/russia-fines-nuclear-engineer-mined-bitcoin"
categories:
  - "Bitcoin"
  - "Blockchain"
  - "Cryptocurrency"
  - "Future Society"
  - "Science & Energy"
tags:
  - "bitcoin"
  - "Russia"
  - "supercomputer"
  - "the digest"
---

# Russia Punishes Guy Who Mined Bitcoin at Top-Secret Nuclear Lab

![A nuclear engineer in Russia was just fined $7,000 for using his top-secret lab's supercomputer to illegally mine Bitcoin at work.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/russia-fines-nuclear-engineer-mined-bitcoin.jpg>)
*\<em\>Image: Yovko Lambrev/Victor Tangermann\</em\>*

## Busted

Russian engineer Denis Baykov was fined 450,000 rubles ($6,880) on Friday for using the supercomputer at the top-secret nuclear lab at which he works to mine Bitcoin.

The nuclear research center in an off-limits town called Sarov, where the former Soviet Union first managed to [build nuclear weapons](<https://futurism.com/russian-submarine-launch-nuke-drones>). The facility contains some of Russia's most powerful supercomputers, [according to *The Moscow Times*](<https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2019/10/01/russian-nuclear-engineer-fined-for-mining-bitcoin-at-top-secret-lab-a67517>) — and three employees apparently couldn't resist leveraging that kind of computing power to mine some cryptocurrency [before getting caught](<https://futurism.com/russian-nuclear-scientists-busted-mining-bitcoin-work-supercomputers>) in February 2018.

## One Down

Baykov worked with two other employees at the All-Russian Research Institute of Experimental Physics to mine the Bitcoin, a feat that required developing special software to mask what they were doing.

The other two, Andrei Rybkin and Andrei Shatokhin, haven't yet been sentenced by the Sarov government, *The Moscow Times* reports. According to a mid-September ruling, Baykov was found guilty of violating the rules for proper supercomputer use. Apparently, top-secret Russian nuclear labs don't endorse using their hardware to make a quick ruble.

## Good Run

The trio did manage to squeak out a few Bitcoins before getting caught, but it's not clear how much Bitcoin they mined and how that compares to the $7,000 fine.

"I can say one thing for sure: they were not detained on the first day they began to mine," defense attorney Alexei Kovalyov said, according to *The Moscow Times*.

**READ MORE:** [Russian Nuclear Engineer Fined for Mining Bitcoin at Top-Secret Lab](<https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2019/10/01/russian-nuclear-engineer-fined-for-mining-bitcoin-at-top-secret-lab-a67517>) \[*The Moscow Times*\]

**More on the Bitcoin bust:** *[Russian Nuclear Scientists Got Busted Mining Bitcoin Using Their Work Supercomputers](<https://futurism.com/russian-nuclear-scientists-busted-mining-bitcoin-work-supercomputers>)*

## Author
Dan Robitzki is a senior reporter for Futurism, where he likes to cover AI, tech ethics, and medicine. He spends his extra time fencing and streaming games from Los Angeles, California.

### Author social links  
[Twitter](<https://x.com/danrobitzski>)