College students ranked second in the top cryptocurrency miners throughout the field, according to a study conducted by the multinational technology giant Cisco and issued on PC Magazine on March 5th.

Cisco security team has been using its clients’ network connection analysis tool Umbrella to investigate potentially illegal crypto-related activities. The tool found out that college campuses are ranked the second biggest crypto miners, which belongs to the energy and utility sector, with 22% compared to 34%.

The threat researcher at Cisco – Austin McBride – has provided further details for PC Magazine regarding the research, that if a student kept the mining system operational for 4 years straight, they would have acquired a significant sum of money upon graduating.

By utilizing the universities’ facilities such as dorms or libraries, these college miners can conveniently avoid the excessive electricity cost for running a crypto mining rig.

“Mining difficulty for a lot of coins is very high right now — which means it costs more for electricity and internet than the profit you can produce from mining those coins. If you don’t have to pay for those costs, then you are in a really good spot for making money on the university’s dime.”