Tesla Driver Has Been Mining Crypto In His Car, Bagging An Extra $800 A Month
Up until now, the main purpose of a car is transport. Sure, we have some rather cool new innovations and even the potential to use a car as an energy storage component, but most of us still use a car as, well, a car.
But, as it turns out, a car isn’t “just” a car anymore: Tesla owners have found a way to turn their EVs into cryptocurrency-mining rigs.
After all, with all the technology built into a Tesla, it’s basically a “giant computer on wheels,” as pointed out by Notebookcheck. Plus, of course, electricity required for the process is already there, too.
One Tesla owner by the name of Siraj Raval tells CNBC that by mining crypto through his 2018 Tesla Model 3, he was getting up to US$800 per month when the price of ether peaked last year.
“It’s so simple to hack into this computer car,” he says.
Some methods he’s tried include running free bitcoin mining software on an Apple Mac Mini M1 and plugging it into the 12V power socket in the Tesla’s center console, or connecting graphics processing units (GPUs) to the car and powering them via the car’s internal battery.
However, he has found that the most profitable method is a combination of hacking the internal Tesla computer, and plugging GPUs directly into the motor.
Another example is Chris Allessi, who got his Tesla before January 2017. This means that he’s entitled to a lifetime of superfast charging for the car. So, of course, he took advantage of that by attempting to mine bitcoin—naturally.
The two things Allessi tried were using a Bitmain Antmainer S9, and an attempt at hacking the Tesla’s firmware and mining the Monero privacy token through the car’s built-in browser.
He did tell CNBC, however, that although it’s possible, it wasn’t really going to be worth it in the long term.
“Why would you want to put that kind of wear and tear on a $40,000 to $100,000 car?” he rationalizes. “Did it work? Yes. Did it mine anything worthwhile to be able to be profitable in any way, shape, or form? No.”
It’s not something that he’s planning on continuing, even though the electricity comes to him free of charge. “The difficulty is so high… I could make more money working at McDonald’s.”
