Trial in London | Who is the originator of bitcoin?

(London) An Australian has been on trial in London since Monday to judge whether he is the father of bitcoin, but he is not the first suspected of being the enigmatic developer behind this founding cryptocurrency.

Its principles are stated on October 31, 2008 in the “white paper”, a nine-page document published under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto, which theorizes that “making online payments directly from one third party to another would make it possible not to go through a financial institution.

Bitcoin has since become the largest cryptocurrency by capitalization (to the tune of approximately 880 billion US dollars according to the Coingecko website).

But after collaborating with other developers to perfect his code, Satoshi disappeared from screens around 2011, and multiple theories have emerged over the years speculating about who is behind this mysterious nickname.

Hal Finney

The first person to receive a bitcoin transaction was the American Hal Finney, a developer and cryptographer, that is to say a specialist in systems intended to encrypt, authenticate and ensure the integrity of data.

But in October 2023, the theory according to which this pioneer of the sector is the father of bitcoin is discredited by a blogger knowledgeable in the field. The amateur investigator explains that he found evidence indicating that Finney, who died in 2014, was participating in a running race at the same time that Satoshi Nakamoto was responding to emails and carrying out transactions on the Bitcoin network.

Dorian Nakamoto

In 2014, Dorian Prenctice Satoshi Nakamoto, a retired Japanese-American engineer, was suspected of being Satoshi by the magazine Newsweek.

This former physicist and physical engineer, now libertarian, initially told the author of the article: “I am no longer involved in this and I cannot discuss it. This was entrusted to other people. They’re taking care of it now. I no longer have any connection.”

Pressed with questions from the media, Dorian Nakamoto quickly denied any involvement in the creation of the cryptocurrency.

It is worth noting that in 2012, Satoshi Nakamoto claimed to be a 37-year-old man living in Japan, on his profile on the website of the P2P Foundation, an organization that studies the impact of technology on society.

But his excellent level of English, peppered with typically British expressions, casts doubt on this hypothesis.

Nick Szabo

Also among the first followers of decentralized currencies, Nick Szabo, an American computer scientist of Hungarian origin, was named as a possible inventor of bitcoin by a blogger in December 2013.

But beyond circumstantial elements, there is no tangible evidence to identify him as Satoshi.

Craig Wright

Since May 2016, Craig Wright, an Australian computer scientist and entrepreneur, has publicly claimed to be the inventor of bitcoin.

The hypothesis was first put forward by two parallel surveys, published by the magazine Wired and the Gizmodo site the previous year, who later cast doubt on its veracity.

The whimsical businessman quickly becomes the bane of developers on the blockchainwhich is similar to a large decentralized transaction register, or exchange platforms like Coinbase, which it accuses of having infringed on the intellectual property rights it claims.

He also lost his defamation suit against a podcast host who called him a fraud.

Since the beginning of February, the businessman has been on trial in London to determine whether or not he is the author of the “white paper”.

Elon Musk

The richest man in the world has not escaped suspicion either.

In a series of articles on the Medium site, a former intern at his company SpaceX hypothesizes that Satoshi is actually Elon Musk. The ex-employee notes that the entrepreneur masters programmatic language and expressions similar to those used by Satoshi, or that a Musk collaborator would have seemed embarrassed by the question on the phone.

Faced with very meager evidence, the tech-savvy billionaire rejected these allegations in November 2017.

A group, a dead person, or an eternal anonymous person

Some have also theorized that a work of this magnitude and complexity would more likely be the work of a collective rather than a single developer.

It is also likely that the real Satoshi Nakamoto has died, or wishes to remain anonymous in order to preserve the integrity of the system he created, based on trust in the multitude rather than one entity or individual.

Furthermore, if he suddenly decided to recover the approximately 980,000 bitcoins he owns, according to researcher Sergio Lerner’s estimate, the equivalent of nearly $44 billion at current prices, Satoshi could collapse the system he created.