The Man Behind Bit-Con
In 2008, a person using the pseudonym published a white paper explaining the basics of Bitcoin. Then, as abruptly as he had emerged, he vanished. Satoshi, who’s known by his first name, controls an estimated 1.1 million Bitcoins, a $75-billion stash that has sat untouched for more than a decade. The mystery of Satoshi’s identity has long obsessed experts. Wright has gone to extraordinary lengths to prove that he is Satoshi. He has presented himself as Bitcoin’s inventor in interviews and social media posts. In lawsuits tried in three countries, he has testified that he wrote the original white paper. After a small-time crypto personality challenged his claims in 2019, Wright sued for defamation. He followed that up with an aggressive suit against software developers working to improve Bitcoin’s code, accusing them of violating his . “A few will be bankrupted, lose their families and collapse,” he declared. This year, several of crypto’s most powerful companies mobilised to stop Wright from bringing cases. An influential group led by , the largest US exchange, and , a company started by Twitter founder , took him to trial in High Court in London. They were seeking a judicial declaration: We may never know for sure who invented Bitcoin, but it wasn’t .
A financial lifeline
Much of what is known about Satoshi Nakamoto comes from hundreds of messages he exchanged with early collaborators, including Gavin Andresen, an American software developer who helped promote Bitcoin in the media. In emails and forum posts, Satoshi wrote about his commitment to privacy and his frustrations with the financial establishment, while revealing little about his background. Then in 2011, with no warning, Satoshi went silent, cutting off communication. “I wish you wouldn’t keep talking about me as a mysterious shadowy figure,” he told Andresen in their final exchange. Hardly anyone had heard of Wright until 2015, when Andy Greenberg, a tech reporter, co-wrote an article for Wired. The article was based partly on private emails and transcripts supplied by an anonymous leaker: “I did my best to try and hide the fact that I’ve been running Bitcoin since 2009,” Wright said in one transcript. “By the end of this, I think half the world is going to bloody know.” The article included a caveat: “Either Wright invented Bitcoin, or he’s a brilliant hoaxer who very badly wants us to believe he did.” By early 2015, Wright was locked in disputes with the Australian tax office, which accused him of backdating documents and conducting “sham transactions”, court records show.
Cryptographic keys
A former colleague put him in touch with Calvin Ayre, an entrepreneur who had made a fortune in the sports betting industry and wanted to invest in crypto. The two decided to publicise his Satoshi claim. The eventual deal included a loan of 2.5 million Australian dollars to resolve Wright’s tax problems. It also made Wright the chief scientist of a new company, which would have “exclusive rights to Craig’s life story”. But when the Wired article appeared that December, it drew a sceptical reaction. There was only one definitive way to prove that he had written the white paper: Satoshi would have access to cryptographic keys unlocking his Bitcoin stash. In 2016, Wright’s sponsors flew Andresen to London, hoping to secure the endorsement of Satoshi’s old collaborator. In a hotel conference room, Wright gave a demonstration meant to show Andresen that he controlled Satoshi’s private keys. Soon, Wright was supposed to make the cryptographic proof public and end the Satoshi mystery forever. But when the day arrived for the big reveal, Wright didn’t offer any proof. Instead, he published a jargon-heavy blog post about the mechanics of “digital signatures”.
Why claim to be Satoshi?
Even after Wright failed to produce the evidence, he retained a band of loyal online followers. He didn’t have access to Satoshi’s private keys, he claimed in court, because he had smashed a hard drive containing them; he described it as an impulsive decision, partly related to his autism. Ayre stood by him, and in 2018, he and Wright launched Bitcoin Satoshi Vision, which trades at about $70 per coin, a fraction of Bitcoin’s price. Rejected by much of the crypto industry, Wright pressed his claim to Satoshi-dom in the courts, pursuing litigation that Ayre helped finance. “He seems to have enough money and backing from others that he can make good on his threats to ruin people financially by bringing expensive litigation,” Steve Lee, a manager at Block, a company that Dorsey co-founded after Twitter, said in a court filing last year. Lee was part of a coalition of prominent crypto companies called the Crypto Open Patent Alliance, or COPA, which was founded to stop patent rules from preventing the development of crypto technology. In 2021, Wright’s lawyers asked COPA and its members to remove the Bitcoin white paper from their websites. COPA responded by suing Wright in High Court in London, seeking a ruling that he did not invent Bitcoin. As the litigation intensified, Christen Ager-Hanssen, a venture investor, joined nChain and helped oversee Wright’s legal affairs. Last year, he switched sides. In an interview, Ager-Hanssen said Wright struck him as clever but delusional. He said, he found it hard to understand why Wright has spent so many years trying to prove that he invented Bitcoin. “I believe he thinks he deserves to be Satoshi,” Ager-Hanssen said.
A judge decides
Dated August 2007, the notes on a Quill pad summarise a meeting that Wright held in which he discussed a new form of digital money. A list of follow-up steps mentions a ‘paper’, set for publication in 2008. The notes were part of a cache of more than 100 “reliance documents” that Wright filed in High Court as evidence that he invented Bitcoin. A forensic expert hired by COPA, however, found that the documents had been doctored. A sworn statement from Hamelin Brands, the parent company of Quill, revealed that the pad didn’t go into circulation until 2012, four years after Bitcoin was invented. Wright took the witness stand in the first week of the trial and insisted that the company was mistaken about the provenance of its own pad. The judge overseeing the proceedings, James Mellor, issued a ruling from the bench. “Dr Wright is not the person who adopted or operated under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto,” he said. The mystery of Bitcoin’s creation seems likely to endure. One morning, in the final stretch of COPA vs Wright, a blond man in a baseball cap shuffled into the gallery, taking a seat among a group of reporters before striking up conversation. Why had he shown up to Wright’s trial? He leaned in to whisper a secret: He was the real Satoshi Nakamoto.
A financial lifeline
Much of what is known about Satoshi Nakamoto comes from hundreds of messages he exchanged with early collaborators, including Gavin Andresen, an American software developer who helped promote Bitcoin in the media. In emails and forum posts, Satoshi wrote about his commitment to privacy and his frustrations with the financial establishment, while revealing little about his background. Then in 2011, with no warning, Satoshi went silent, cutting off communication. “I wish you wouldn’t keep talking about me as a mysterious shadowy figure,” he told Andresen in their final exchange. Hardly anyone had heard of Wright until 2015, when Andy Greenberg, a tech reporter, co-wrote an article for Wired. The article was based partly on private emails and transcripts supplied by an anonymous leaker: “I did my best to try and hide the fact that I’ve been running Bitcoin since 2009,” Wright said in one transcript. “By the end of this, I think half the world is going to bloody know.” The article included a caveat: “Either Wright invented Bitcoin, or he’s a brilliant hoaxer who very badly wants us to believe he did.” By early 2015, Wright was locked in disputes with the Australian tax office, which accused him of backdating documents and conducting “sham transactions”, court records show.
Cryptographic keys
A former colleague put him in touch with Calvin Ayre, an entrepreneur who had made a fortune in the sports betting industry and wanted to invest in crypto. The two decided to publicise his Satoshi claim. The eventual deal included a loan of 2.5 million Australian dollars to resolve Wright’s tax problems. It also made Wright the chief scientist of a new company, which would have “exclusive rights to Craig’s life story”. But when the Wired article appeared that December, it drew a sceptical reaction. There was only one definitive way to prove that he had written the white paper: Satoshi would have access to cryptographic keys unlocking his Bitcoin stash. In 2016, Wright’s sponsors flew Andresen to London, hoping to secure the endorsement of Satoshi’s old collaborator. In a hotel conference room, Wright gave a demonstration meant to show Andresen that he controlled Satoshi’s private keys. Soon, Wright was supposed to make the cryptographic proof public and end the Satoshi mystery forever. But when the day arrived for the big reveal, Wright didn’t offer any proof. Instead, he published a jargon-heavy blog post about the mechanics of “digital signatures”.
Why claim to be Satoshi?
Even after Wright failed to produce the evidence, he retained a band of loyal online followers. He didn’t have access to Satoshi’s private keys, he claimed in court, because he had smashed a hard drive containing them; he described it as an impulsive decision, partly related to his autism. Ayre stood by him, and in 2018, he and Wright launched Bitcoin Satoshi Vision, which trades at about $70 per coin, a fraction of Bitcoin’s price. Rejected by much of the crypto industry, Wright pressed his claim to Satoshi-dom in the courts, pursuing litigation that Ayre helped finance. “He seems to have enough money and backing from others that he can make good on his threats to ruin people financially by bringing expensive litigation,” Steve Lee, a manager at Block, a company that Dorsey co-founded after Twitter, said in a court filing last year. Lee was part of a coalition of prominent crypto companies called the Crypto Open Patent Alliance, or COPA, which was founded to stop patent rules from preventing the development of crypto technology. In 2021, Wright’s lawyers asked COPA and its members to remove the Bitcoin white paper from their websites. COPA responded by suing Wright in High Court in London, seeking a ruling that he did not invent Bitcoin. As the litigation intensified, Christen Ager-Hanssen, a venture investor, joined nChain and helped oversee Wright’s legal affairs. Last year, he switched sides. In an interview, Ager-Hanssen said Wright struck him as clever but delusional. He said, he found it hard to understand why Wright has spent so many years trying to prove that he invented Bitcoin. “I believe he thinks he deserves to be Satoshi,” Ager-Hanssen said.
A judge decides
Dated August 2007, the notes on a Quill pad summarise a meeting that Wright held in which he discussed a new form of digital money. A list of follow-up steps mentions a ‘paper’, set for publication in 2008. The notes were part of a cache of more than 100 “reliance documents” that Wright filed in High Court as evidence that he invented Bitcoin. A forensic expert hired by COPA, however, found that the documents had been doctored. A sworn statement from Hamelin Brands, the parent company of Quill, revealed that the pad didn’t go into circulation until 2012, four years after Bitcoin was invented. Wright took the witness stand in the first week of the trial and insisted that the company was mistaken about the provenance of its own pad. The judge overseeing the proceedings, James Mellor, issued a ruling from the bench. “Dr Wright is not the person who adopted or operated under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto,” he said. The mystery of Bitcoin’s creation seems likely to endure. One morning, in the final stretch of COPA vs Wright, a blond man in a baseball cap shuffled into the gallery, taking a seat among a group of reporters before striking up conversation. Why had he shown up to Wright’s trial? He leaned in to whisper a secret: He was the real Satoshi Nakamoto.
Source: Forex-Markets-Economic Times
