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Satoshi came out of retirement in March 2014 to state that he was not Dorian Nakamoto, in the wake of a Newsweek article that falsely fingered the latter as Sat

Satoshi came out of retirement in March 2014 to state that he was not Dorian Nakamoto, in the wake of a Newsweek article that falsely fingered the latter as Satoshi: https://techcrunch.com/2014/03/06/satoshi-dorian/ https://techcrunch.com/2014/03/06/satoshi-dorian/ I still think it was Hal Finney, who was in similar cypherpunk circles, created the first PoW system, received the first Bitcoin transaction, lived in the same town as Dorian Nakamoto for 10 years, was diagnosed with ALS about a year before Satoshi disappeared from Bitcoin development, died in August 2014, and was cryopreserved.

acjohnson55 5y ago
Finney must be considered a candidate, but considering that Sassaman took his own life after declining health, it's possible he may have put in place a succession plan for the ability to speak as Satoshi. Which could be separate from a succession plan for the Satoshi bitcoin hoard.
abecedarius 5y ago
Besides the points others have made here, iirc Finney explicitly denied it. (Same for Szabo.) He didn't have to -- a Glomar response would be perfectly reasonable whether or not you are Satoshi. I'd take the explicit answer of someone not known to be a liar as the first piece of evidence to mention, not an "oh by the way" far down in the list.
jjordan 5y ago
I think it's Nick Szabo. This is the article that convinced me: https://www.bitcoininsider.org/article/78686/i-designed-bitcoi-gold-many-facts-pointing-nick-being-satoshi https://www.bitcoininsider.org/article/78686/i-designed-bitc...
- doopy1 5y ago
  Nah, it was Paul Le Roux https://www.wired.com/story/was-bitcoin-created-by-this-international-drug-dealer-maybe/ https://www.wired.com/story/was-bitcoin-created-by-this-inte...
  - programmarchy 5y ago
    It was also probably not one person, but a group.
    - qez 5y ago
      No, there is no reason to believe that.
      - robbedpeter 5y ago
        There is reason to disbelieve it. The text analyses that have been done point at Satoshi being an individual. Beyond that, if it were a group, they could have used someone as a spokesperson, but then you have a conspiracy of Satoshis, which is less possible. People, and especially geeks, like to talk. Someone would have tripped up by now, or moved bitcoin to fiat.
        prawn 5y ago
        I agree that the group increases the risk of someone talking. Would having a spokesperson that knew the identity of group members be a significant risk once this amount of money is involved? It would surely motivate serious threats to the spokesperson and their family? By the time there was media interest in the identity of Satoshi, what would have been the value of their holding? Even then, whoever it is had to have held to their privacy even in advance of Bitcoin being worth incredible amounts of money.
        Graffur 5y ago
        > People, and especially geeks, like to talk Is this backed up by anything?
        im3w1l 5y ago
        Military / intelligence agency would not have tripped up. Their motivation could be promoting democracy (they did make Tor for this purpose after all) and/or money for black ops.
    - 5y ago
- futurepast 5y ago
  It's 100% Nick Szabo with Hal Finney's help. There's a non-zero chance that there's an NSA/IC employee who worked with them. Just based on the 1996 NSA paper "How to Make a Mint" and the potential that a government cryptocurrency is the ultimate solution for the inflation problem. Regulated stablecoins and/or a CBDC is the perfect way to disintermediate the banks from the dollar. Source: speculation but I was around before bitcoin
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - lottin 5y ago
    The "inflation problem" is not perceived as a problem by hardly anyone (certainly not by a government agency) since central banks around the world have shown that they are very capable of keeping inflation near the intended target. And the idea that the NSA thinks a cryptocurrency would be a solution to such a non-existent problem is even more bizarre.
    - mejutoco 5y ago
      If it leads to stagflation it might be a real problem, that definitely worries central banks. Several central banks around the world are working on digital currencies (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_bank_digital_currency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_bank_digital_currency). These would unlock more complex measures than giving people money and hope for the best to activate the economy (people might just save the money). Things like giving money to spend only in certain things, or for a limited time might come into effect then.
      - aspenmayer 5y ago
        China’s CBDC already incorporates limited time balances, which were demonstrated with airdrops that had an expiration date. Flexa has partnered with various crypto projects and traditional business to offer crypto denominated coupons that have an expiration date as well. I’ll admit I’m bullish on crypto generally, but not like this. It may work for CBDCs, in that it will drive spending over saving to some degree, but I suspect they will be treated like radioactive hot potatoes. What’s to stop someone from selling their CBCD and simply buying a competing stablecoin that isn’t going to expire? Inflation can be both unpredictable and devastating; yet, predictable sudden devastating devaluation via expiration dates is held up as an improvement over the non-CBDC stablecoin status quo?
- aero-glide2 5y ago
  Does anyone know what happened to Nick Szabo? He was very active on twitter (33,000 tweets, a bit crazy). He suddenly stopped tweeting from March 2nd.
  - drcode 5y ago
    Twitter isn't very functional for celebrities in the crypto space, due to the incessant spam. I bet he just got sick of it.
- drcode 5y ago
  Being a developer, and following Nick Szabo over the years, I just don't think he's enough of a coder mindset to have created Bitcoin. Maybe he could have made it by teaming up with someone else (Not disparaging Nick Szabo, he's super smart but not a coder at heart)
miles 5y ago
> Satoshi came out of retirement in March 2014 to state that he was not Dorian Nakamoto It appears far from certain that Satoshi posted that message on Ning in March of 2014: Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto targeted by email hack https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/sep/09/bitcoin-creator-satoshi-nakamoto-email-hack https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/sep/09/bitcoin-c... > An administrator of the semi-official Bitcoin Talk forum, Michael Marquardt, posted on Monday night that he had received an email from Nakamoto’s old address, “not spoofed in any way”, that made him certain the account was compromised. > “It seems very likely that either Satoshi’s email account in particular or gmx.com in general was compromised, and the email account is now under the control of someone else,” Marquardt wrote under his username, theymos[1]. “Perhaps satoshin@gmx.com expired and then someone else registered it.” > Shortly after Marquardt’s post, “Nakamoto” posted on the Ning messageboard, one of the first places the real Nakamoto announced the creation of Bitcoin. Using the same forum account to append a comment to that announcement, the apparent hacker warned Satoshi that his details were for sale. [1] https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=775174.msg8734884#msg8734884 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=775174.msg8734884#ms...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
reducesuffering 5y ago
Hal Finney theory is too convoluted what with him talking to himself, a stark contrast in programming styles between Hal's organized manner and Satoshi's haphazard hacking, and no connection to the genesis block being a headline from UK/Europe and British lingo. A Nakamoto in town is just a common coincidence, there are 2,800 of them in the US.
- Graffur 5y ago
  Out of curiosity is there anything I can view to compare the two styles?
  - reducesuffering 5y ago
    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28816037 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28816037 as a starting point to poke around the difference in their commits
- drcode 5y ago
  There is nothing more straightforward and less convoluted than some dude creating a sock puppet account to interact with in order to help launch a product.
wp381640 5y ago
> I still think it was Hal Finney Finney didn't mix British and American English the way Satoshi did in his writing. Finney was also an experienced and much better developer[0] than Satoshi[1] [0] https://github.com/halfinney/bitcoin/commit/dc411b51e0a3cffc4a599382ef0a9b92486f59d5 https://github.com/halfinney/bitcoin/commit/dc411b51e0a3cffc... [1] https://github.com/Maguines/Bitcoin-v0.1/blob/master/bitcoin0.1/src/main.cpp https://github.com/Maguines/Bitcoin-v0.1/blob/master/bitcoin...
- derangedHorse 5y ago
  Nothing in that PR showed he was a much better developer, he just implemented an optimization he found in a book. Contrary to the medium post, Satoshi's code was fairly clean for a first release. The omission of unit tests just shows the uncertainty Satoshi had about the project (why make tests for something that hasn't found adoption?).
  - SiliconVallet 5y ago
    Because TDD is dumb and actual hacking and development doesn't revolve around unit testing?
    - dang 5y ago
      "Eschew flamebait. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

acjohnson55 5y ago

Finney must be considered a candidate, but considering that Sassaman took his own life after declining health, it's possible he may have put in place a succession plan for the ability to speak as Satoshi. Which could be separate from a succession plan for the Satoshi bitcoin hoard.

abecedarius 5y ago

Besides the points others have made here, iirc Finney explicitly denied it. (Same for Szabo.) He didn't have to -- a Glomar response would be perfectly reasonable whether or not you are Satoshi. I'd take the explicit answer of someone not known to be a liar as the first piece of evidence to mention, not an "oh by the way" far down in the list.

jjordan 5y ago

I think it's Nick Szabo. This is the article that convinced me: https://www.bitcoininsider.org/article/78686/i-designed-bitcoi-gold-many-facts-pointing-nick-being-satoshi https://www.bitcoininsider.org/article/78686/i-designed-bitc...

doopy1 5y ago
Nah, it was Paul Le Roux https://www.wired.com/story/was-bitcoin-created-by-this-international-drug-dealer-maybe/ https://www.wired.com/story/was-bitcoin-created-by-this-inte...
- programmarchy 5y ago
  It was also probably not one person, but a group.
  - qez 5y ago
    No, there is no reason to believe that.
    - robbedpeter 5y ago
      There is reason to disbelieve it. The text analyses that have been done point at Satoshi being an individual. Beyond that, if it were a group, they could have used someone as a spokesperson, but then you have a conspiracy of Satoshis, which is less possible. People, and especially geeks, like to talk. Someone would have tripped up by now, or moved bitcoin to fiat.
      - prawn 5y ago
        I agree that the group increases the risk of someone talking. Would having a spokesperson that knew the identity of group members be a significant risk once this amount of money is involved? It would surely motivate serious threats to the spokesperson and their family? By the time there was media interest in the identity of Satoshi, what would have been the value of their holding? Even then, whoever it is had to have held to their privacy even in advance of Bitcoin being worth incredible amounts of money.
      - Graffur 5y ago
        > People, and especially geeks, like to talk Is this backed up by anything?
      - im3w1l 5y ago
        Military / intelligence agency would not have tripped up. Their motivation could be promoting democracy (they did make Tor for this purpose after all) and/or money for black ops.
  - 5y ago
futurepast 5y ago
It's 100% Nick Szabo with Hal Finney's help. There's a non-zero chance that there's an NSA/IC employee who worked with them. Just based on the 1996 NSA paper "How to Make a Mint" and the potential that a government cryptocurrency is the ultimate solution for the inflation problem. Regulated stablecoins and/or a CBDC is the perfect way to disintermediate the banks from the dollar. Source: speculation but I was around before bitcoin
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- lottin 5y ago
  The "inflation problem" is not perceived as a problem by hardly anyone (certainly not by a government agency) since central banks around the world have shown that they are very capable of keeping inflation near the intended target. And the idea that the NSA thinks a cryptocurrency would be a solution to such a non-existent problem is even more bizarre.
  - mejutoco 5y ago
    If it leads to stagflation it might be a real problem, that definitely worries central banks. Several central banks around the world are working on digital currencies (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_bank_digital_currency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_bank_digital_currency). These would unlock more complex measures than giving people money and hope for the best to activate the economy (people might just save the money). Things like giving money to spend only in certain things, or for a limited time might come into effect then.
    - aspenmayer 5y ago
      China’s CBDC already incorporates limited time balances, which were demonstrated with airdrops that had an expiration date. Flexa has partnered with various crypto projects and traditional business to offer crypto denominated coupons that have an expiration date as well. I’ll admit I’m bullish on crypto generally, but not like this. It may work for CBDCs, in that it will drive spending over saving to some degree, but I suspect they will be treated like radioactive hot potatoes. What’s to stop someone from selling their CBCD and simply buying a competing stablecoin that isn’t going to expire? Inflation can be both unpredictable and devastating; yet, predictable sudden devastating devaluation via expiration dates is held up as an improvement over the non-CBDC stablecoin status quo?
aero-glide2 5y ago
Does anyone know what happened to Nick Szabo? He was very active on twitter (33,000 tweets, a bit crazy). He suddenly stopped tweeting from March 2nd.
- drcode 5y ago
  Twitter isn't very functional for celebrities in the crypto space, due to the incessant spam. I bet he just got sick of it.
drcode 5y ago
Being a developer, and following Nick Szabo over the years, I just don't think he's enough of a coder mindset to have created Bitcoin. Maybe he could have made it by teaming up with someone else (Not disparaging Nick Szabo, he's super smart but not a coder at heart)

miles 5y ago

> Satoshi came out of retirement in March 2014 to state that he was not Dorian Nakamoto It appears far from certain that Satoshi posted that message on Ning in March of 2014: Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto targeted by email hack https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/sep/09/bitcoin-creator-satoshi-nakamoto-email-hack https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/sep/09/bitcoin-c... > An administrator of the semi-official Bitcoin Talk forum, Michael Marquardt, posted on Monday night that he had received an email from Nakamoto’s old address, “not spoofed in any way”, that made him certain the account was compromised. > “It seems very likely that either Satoshi’s email account in particular or gmx.com in general was compromised, and the email account is now under the control of someone else,” Marquardt wrote under his username, theymos[1]. “Perhaps satoshin@gmx.com expired and then someone else registered it.” > Shortly after Marquardt’s post, “Nakamoto” posted on the Ning messageboard, one of the first places the real Nakamoto announced the creation of Bitcoin. Using the same forum account to append a comment to that announcement, the apparent hacker warned Satoshi that his details were for sale. [1] https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=775174.msg8734884#msg8734884 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=775174.msg8734884#ms...

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

reducesuffering 5y ago

Hal Finney theory is too convoluted what with him talking to himself, a stark contrast in programming styles between Hal's organized manner and Satoshi's haphazard hacking, and no connection to the genesis block being a headline from UK/Europe and British lingo. A Nakamoto in town is just a common coincidence, there are 2,800 of them in the US.

Graffur 5y ago
Out of curiosity is there anything I can view to compare the two styles?
- reducesuffering 5y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28816037 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28816037 as a starting point to poke around the difference in their commits
drcode 5y ago
There is nothing more straightforward and less convoluted than some dude creating a sock puppet account to interact with in order to help launch a product.

wp381640 5y ago

> I still think it was Hal Finney Finney didn't mix British and American English the way Satoshi did in his writing. Finney was also an experienced and much better developer[0] than Satoshi[1] [0] https://github.com/halfinney/bitcoin/commit/dc411b51e0a3cffc4a599382ef0a9b92486f59d5 https://github.com/halfinney/bitcoin/commit/dc411b51e0a3cffc... [1] https://github.com/Maguines/Bitcoin-v0.1/blob/master/bitcoin0.1/src/main.cpp https://github.com/Maguines/Bitcoin-v0.1/blob/master/bitcoin...

derangedHorse 5y ago
Nothing in that PR showed he was a much better developer, he just implemented an optimization he found in a book. Contrary to the medium post, Satoshi's code was fairly clean for a first release. The omission of unit tests just shows the uncertainty Satoshi had about the project (why make tests for something that hasn't found adoption?).
- SiliconVallet 5y ago
  Because TDD is dumb and actual hacking and development doesn't revolve around unit testing?
  - dang 5y ago
    "Eschew flamebait. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html