As the price of Bitcoin hit $18000 last year, many who had never heard the word cryptocurrency woke up to its existence. We finally started taking seriously our geeky friends who told us that they were using their computers to mine digital currencies and storing them in virtual wallets. And we cursed the time when our friend tried selling us Bitcoin for $30 and we dismissed it as a scam.

Well, my geeky friend is now rich but no longer mines Bitcoins or any virtual currency for that matter. This is because as the world started taking cryptocurrencies more seriously it became harder to mine them. It required more intense hardware that wasn’t easy to buy.

Now, to mine Ethereum or any currency, you will require a motherboard attached to at least five graphic cards. And these aren’t ordinary graphic cards, these are high-end graphic cards, the kind used for 3D image rendering or by serious gamers. This contraption of motherboard and graphic cards is called a GPU rig.

Bitcoin has become so difficult to mine that there are special machines called Ant miners that are used to mine it. These have a life of 7 to 10 months and produce so much heat that they melt their own parts.

Throughout the world companies set up mining farms, large warehouses filled with rigs to mine cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin. As the business in Pakistan grew, a small community in Pakistan, who had been following the rise of cryptocurrencies, also decided to invest in GPU rigs. These use less electricity than Ant miners and have a longer life.

One such person is Khurram Khalid, a 32-year-old businessman, who started mining cryptocurrencies about two months ago. Khalid says he decides almost on a daily basis which virtual currency he will mine, depending on what the market prices are. He shows me apps that he uses to keep track of the various digital currencies and how they are doing. There are around 1384 cryptocurrencies around right now.

"I was tech savvy and into gaming so has a good graphic card, so some friends suggested I start mining," he says about why he started. What started with one graphic card has now multiplied into 10 rigs and proper operation.

While Khalid is open about mining and the number of rigs he has, most people are not. This is largely because there is no policy on cryptocurrencies in Pakistan and scams like OneCoin have prompted the government to issue warnings against investments in them. The process of mining is also energy intensive with one rig using approximately 500 watts, so they are fearful of it being declared illegal.

An ongoing case in the Lahore High Court has everyone on edge as well. The case is based on a petition by Muhammad Talha against the state to declare Bitcoin illegal.

"There are many fears," says Ghulam Ahmed Roomi, one of the main suppliers of GPU rigs in Pakistan adding, "The government believes that virtual currencies will be harder to trace and so will be used for criminal activities and then they fear mining uses a lot of electricity."

The petition also mentions these issues among others.

He doesn’t dismiss these problems as untrue but says that money is put into criminal activities even without using cryptocurrencies. "The FIA also arrested two people a few weeks ago. How did they do that if they can’t trace transactions," he added.

As far as using electricity is concerned, Khalid says that all his rigs run on a commercial metre. "This is just like any other business and everyone I know who runs these rigs at a large level does so on commercial metres," he says.

Roomi goes even further saying that like any other industry the government should regularise it and charge industrial tariffs on mining.

None of these though have deterred people from setting up rigs and mining. Fouad Bajwa, an Internet and ICT public policy analyst at FC College, says these fears are unfounded. He says there are no notifications about cryptocurrency in Pakistan that would decide its status.

"This is also the first time the government is coming into contact with something like this," says Bajwa of cryptocurrencies. He says the government agencies and people need to be educated on it to dispel myths perpetuated on social media.

The State Bank does not recognise cryptocurrencies but has put out a warning telling people to be aware of Ponzi schemes around cryptocurrencies, largely after the OneCoin issue. Deciding the legal fate of cryptocurrencies though will not be done by anyone agency; it requires the collaboration of different government departments such as the Security and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) and the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR).

Meanwhile, two weeks ago the FIA arrested two people who were supposedly Bitcoin traders and had been involved in illicit activities over the Dark web. So, their fears aren’t completely unfounded, says Shahid Hassan, Deputy Director of FIA’s cybercrime cell. "We don’t say declare Bitcoin illegal, it is already illegal because as currency and finance is the State Bank’s domain and it doesn’t recognise this cryptocurrency."

He says the FIA simply wants to bring it under the umbrella of cybercrime so that they can take action on it. He also adds that because of a negative trade deficit, Pakistan will have to prohibit cryptocurrencies because it might have adverse effects on the country’s economy.

Bajwa believes it is highly unlikely that the government will declare cryptocurrencies illegal and he says even if it does it won’t matter to miners because most of them from Pakistan are already based abroad.

Roomi says that monitoring mining will be very difficult for the government if they were to declare it illegal. "The equipment you need is nothing special -- it is just graphic cards and a motherboard, so what will they do to prevent people from importing or buying graphic cards," he says.

As Pakistanis grapple with what the status of cryptocurrencies is, more people enter the business every day. A graphic card that cost Rs50, 000 last month now costs Rs75, 000 meaning that to set up one rig you require over Rs2 lakh. This is not an easy investment to make and most involved in it will have no qualms or financial problems in moving their businesses outside Pakistan.