Now, you may remember us mentioning the Government Vs Freedom of Will issue every now and then. We do our best to remain objective but sometimes we swear we can see patterns in what we are assured are completely random events.

What happened?

T-Mobile’s 700 MHz LTE network in Brooklyn was suffering from “spurious emissions” generated by Victor Rosario’s mining equipment, Antminer to be precise. To be even more precise, the official notice from the FCC stated that the Antminer was “generating spurious emissions on frequencies assigned to T-Mobile’s broadband network and causing harmful interference.”

If you’re watching the world of cryptocurrency closely you may already know about the latest and greatest from the New York City: a resident, Victor Rosario, put his mining equipment to good use in hope of getting lucky and pumping some money out of virtual reality for his kids’ university fund.

What he got instead was a letter from the Federal Communications Commission stating he only had a few days to stop whatever he was doing and cease and desist, otherwise there would be consequences: heavy fines and seizure of equipment as well as, we’re reading between the lines, another kind of seizures. FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel’s nonchalant Tweeter status, ironically reads: “The future belongs to the connected”.

T-Mobile and security issues

We remind you that on February the 5th T-Mobile was sued by Carlos Tapang for having weak security which allowed hackers to relieve his virtual currency account of just over $20 000.

T-Mobile, according to Tapang, had a security loophole which allowed a caller to call the support multiple times until the caller was allowed access without further identity verifications. There were also similar incident reports from other users.

What is an Antminer s5?

This is a device that is probably the best for bitcoin mining in terms of hash speed and efficiency. You can get a used Antminer for less than $200, making it ideal for users who are looking for fast ROI. It also doesn’t use up too much power, which is convenient. At the date of its release, in 2014, it was one of the more progressive pieces of equipment. However, since then many more models were produced that can outdo it performance-wise. It’s not very good for usage at home because of its noisiness. And it’s not exactly new. Bitcoiniminingathome.com states unequivocally that it is “without doubt an inappropriate device to run in your living environment, engulfing conversation and irritating people as well as pets”.

It’s not a very profitable piece of equipment since it’s currently quite old, and buying a new one certainly wouldn’t be worth the money you spend on it. The only thing this equipment is good for is learning the ropes of bitcoin mining.

The reasoning behind it

We were quite surprised anyone would still have one at home, and we were even more surprised the FCC would, in effect, kick someone when they’re down. It was comparable to us to being mean to someone who uses a dial-up connection in 2018 or kicking puppies. The FCC has since posed a set of questions to Rosario, enquiring whether he intended to use the device further and stating he should send to them the exact specifications of the device and where it was purchased. There seems to be no indication so far of exactly how the equipment was creating harmful interference.

There are two possibilities here, we think. It could be that this is a next step in the initiative to control the Bitcoin trade that we see happening in other countries.

Or it could be that the technology moves so fast that the equipment that was released in 2014 is already as obsolete as those 90’s computers that were giving off radiation and therefore had to be destroyed. Could it be that a device created in 2014 is already so ancient that it is starting to create “spurious emissions” of radiation when faced with the more modern equipment?

What do you think?

We think this could be the beginning of government’s attempts to control a currency that so far has proven its complete immunity to control, just like the Internet did at the time. If it conveniently turned out that mining equipment was dangerous, there would be a legal ground for confiscating all of it, handing the control of finances back to the government. Then again, it could be that Rosario’s device was actually harmful, leaking radiation into the sewers and creating more Teenage Ninja Turtles as we speak.