Bitcoin Miners Are Starving Entire Cities Of Electricity

SUKHUMI -- In the side streets and narrow alleys of Abkhazia’s main city, a low growl and an oily stench are commonplace. Thrumming diesel generators provide power amid rolling blackouts that have infuriated residents and evoked memories of the post-war chaos nearly three decades ago. But what’s more infuriating for many Abkhaz is what’s causing the blackouts: bitcoin. Or, to be more precise, the cryptocurrency “miners” whose computer servers are sucking the breakaway Georgian region’s electrical grid dry. “To…