Satoshi Nakamoto theories and candidates

[dkbit98]

source

Satoshi Nakamoto is the name used by the presumed pseudonymous person or persons who developed bitcoin, authored the bitcoin white paper, and created and deployed bitcoin's original reference implementation. As part of the implementation, Nakamoto also devised the first blockchain database. In the process, Nakamoto was the first to solve the double-spending problem for digital currency using a peer-to-peer network. Nakamoto was active in the development of bitcoin up until December 2010. Many people have claimed, or have been claimed, to be Nakamoto.

source: wikipedia

What we know about Satoshi:

- Satoshi bitcointalk profile  (BPIP)


One of the last posts he made in bitcointalk  forum was about WikiLeaks:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2228.msg29479#msg29479

It would have been nice to get this attention in any other context.  WikiLeaks has kicked the hornet's nest, and the swarm is headed towards us.

Email adress satoshin@gmx.com Satoshi used before (until it was compromised)



He wrote himself on his p2p profile this: 'man from Japan, born on April 5, 1975'
http://p2pfoundation.ning.com/profile/SatoshiNakamoto

Message Satoshi left in bitcoin blockchain:

Block 0
000000000019d6689c085ae165831e934ff763ae46a2a6c172b3f1b60a8ce26f
"The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks"

 
thetimes.co.uk

Satoshi Whitepaper early ecash draft:
https://draftable.com/compare/rCuIgdwzImUI
archive: https://archive.vn/ovRGY

Satoshi WeiDai email conversation:
https://www.gwern.net/docs/bitcoin/2008-nakamoto#
archive: https://archive.vn/edJnF

Potential Satoshi candidates:

- Len Sassaman
- Dorian Nakamoto
- Adam Back
- Hal Finney
- Vili Lehdonvirta
- Shinichi Mochizuki
- Elon Musk
- Nick Szabo
- Wei Dai
- John Nash
- Phil Zimmermann
- Dave Kleiman
- Paul Le Roux
- Tatsuaki Okamoto
- Vladimir Oksman
- Charles Bry
- David Chaum
- Michael Clear
- Neal J. King
- Martti Malmi
- Sergey Nazarov
- Government Agency
- We are all Satoshi

Satoshi real identity may never be known and that is probably the best for everyone, but mystery remains so I decided to collect some basic information in this topic.

I would exclude Dorian Nakamoto and some other people from this list, but they became so much connected with Bitcoin history that I just left them, and for most of them there is some wild theory floating around

What we know with 100% certainty is that Satoshi Nakamoto is NOT Craig Steven Wright better known as Faketoshi.

Faketoshi is a term used for a person who claim they are the real Satoshi Nakamoto, creator of Bitcoin.


More interesting forum topics about Satoshi will be added here:

 Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? Part History, Part Mystery, and a New Solution!
 satoshin@gmx.com is compromised
 Who is Satoshi Nakamoto ? Suspects, frauds and conspiracies on bitcointalk.
 I gathered every Satoshi Nakamoto thread.
 Still "Finding Satoshi" then ...
 Whois Satoshi? Known Satoshi IP addresses? ...

[Yogee]

Didn't Hal Finney already said he had no idea who Satoshi Nakamoto was anymore before he passed away [RIP LEGEND]. He couldn't be talking to himself in those emails.

I may as well say that Elon Musk is the real Doge founder hehe.

The real Satoshi Nakamoto may have been abducted by a Government Agency.

[odolvlobo]

You should add Dave Kleiman to your list.

[BitcoinFX]

You should add Dave Kleiman to your list.

Dave Kleiman was a digital forensic research specialist ...

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Kleiman

The current Wright vs Kleiman court case has documented evidence that a text note on one of his PC's contained the following ...

"Is this a Satoshi address ?" (or words to that effect) [citation needed]

Dave most likely saw the Bitcoin software release here:

Bitcoin v0.1 released
Satoshi Nakamoto satoshi at vistomail.com
Thu Jan 8 14:27:40 EST 2009
- https://www.metzdowd.com/pipermail/cryptography/2009-January/014994.html

[heise online UK] Secure deletion: a single overwrite will do it
Dave Kleiman dave at davekleiman.com
Tue Jan 20 19:18:39
- https://www.metzdowd.com/pipermail/cryptography/2009-January/014994.html

January 2009 Archives by thread
- https://www.metzdowd.com/pipermail/cryptography/2009-January/thread.html#14994

The above is a 'subscribed' mailing list, so Dave would of received the information by email.

To this day it remains unclear if Dave actually mined any Bitcoin.

I do recall this ...

- https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4359615.40

At one point in time, a number of years ago now, I considered it possible that Dave may have played a part in Bitcoin development.

However, I'd say today that I'm 99.99% certain that Dave had nothing whatsoever to do with Bitcoin creation.

The above ambiguity is where CSW's 'affinity sham' claim stems from.

...

If you want to know some facts about the real Satoshi, then this blog post is historically factual ...

- https://whoissatoshi.wordpress.com/2016/02/20/satoshi-in-california/

Also see ...

Still "Finding Satoshi" then ...
- https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5165538.msg54950273#msg54950273

and

Whois Satoshi? Known Satoshi IP addresses? ...
- https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5155191.msg55065045#msg55065045

 

[Baofeng]

Another interesting thread about the man himself by @xtraelv, Who is Satoshi Nakamoto ? Suspects, frauds and conspiracies on bitcointalk.

And by @BlackHatCoiner - I gathered every Satoshi Nakamoto thread.

[ashmodeus]

how elon musk on the list ? for me its just no sense,u know just because he believe about bitcoin it doesn't mean he is satoshi and also so far on 2008 he totally rekt as i read on magazine , and i also believe when crisis 2008 happened , he couldn't possibly think of anything other than saving Tesla from bankruptcy.

On 18 August 2008, the domain name bitcoin.org was registered.[11] Later that year, on 31 October, a link to a paper authored by Satoshi Nakamoto titled Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System[12] was posted to a cryptography mailing list.[13] This paper detailed methods of using a peer-to-peer network to generate what was described as "a system for electronic transactions without relying on trust".[14][15][16] On 3 January 2009, the bitcoin network came into existence with Satoshi Nakamoto mining the genesis block of bitcoin (block number 0), which had a reward of 50 bitcoins.[14][17] Embedded in the coinbase of this block was the text.

A video from the December 2008 event has gone viral after being shared on Twitter yesterday by Tesla Owners of Silicon Valley. "Whenever somebody buys a Tesla Roadster sports car... every penny that Tesla makes goes into the development of a smaller, lower-cost vehicle," says Mr Musk in the video

its imposibble to do everything like that in a single year.

[zanezane]

If satoshi was Hal Finney then having multi accounts is not something that should be frowned upon in this forum instead it is being encouraged  . Let's be serious about this, no one in their right mind cares anymore about who the real satoshi is. If you don't want your identity plastered all over the Internet then you should know the feeling of being like satoshi,  respect begets respect right lads?

[dkbit98]

If you want to know about some facts about the real Satoshi, then this blog post is historically factual ...

- https://whoissatoshi.wordpress.com/2016/02/20/satoshi-in-california/

Thank you for posting this interesting read!
I updated information in first post and added new links.

After recently watching Silk Road movie I can't help but think how someone should make a good movie (not documentary) about Satoshi Nakamoto using information collected during all this years.
It could be some joint effort from Bitcoin whales, community and supporters to paint a real picture about importance of Bitcoin and decentralization, and this will let Hollywood ruined it with some idiotic script if they make it first.

Another interesting thread about the man himself by @xtraelv, Who is Satoshi Nakamoto ? Suspects, frauds and conspiracies on bitcointalk.

And by @BlackHatCoiner - I gathered every Satoshi Nakamoto thread.

Thanks! Added this to my collection.

If satoshi was Hal Finney then having multi accounts is not something that should be frowned upon in this forum instead it is being encouraged   . Let's be serious about this, no one in their right mind cares anymore about who the real satoshi is. If you don't want your identity plastered all over the Internet then you should know the feeling of being like satoshi,  respect begets respect right lads?

My theory is that Satoshi was not just one person, and Hal Finney surely played a big part in Bitcoin history but I am not saying he is Satoshi.
I also don't think that Elon Musk in Satoshi, but for each of the name on the list there is some theoretical stories and articles.
Not sure if nobody cares who Satoshi is.... some governments would probably like to lock him (or them) up in prison for life.

[chinesetranslation.com]

This is what I believe to be true:
1 it's not one person, but a team.
2 satoshi is alive today.

What I'm uncertain about but maybe true:
3  satoshi developers were not  famous developers and didn't have online identity, if this is true, then it's not possible for anyone to guess exactly who.  

 
Has anyone found some clues by analyizing all of satoshi's online messages? This won't be a short read tho.
https://fx-c.com/en/satoshi/

[famelor]

I like a recent Wired article a lot: Candidate: Paul Le Roux:

https://www.wired.com/story/was-bitcoin-created-by-this-international-drug-dealer-maybe/

Somewhat convincing but definitely entertaining!

[dkbit98]

I like a recent Wired article a lot: Candidate: Paul Le Roux:

https://www.wired.com/story/was-bitcoin-created-by-this-international-drug-dealer-maybe/

Somewhat convincing but definitely entertaining!

Wired sure likes to write about criminals and maybe help police catch them like McAfee.

I doubt that Paul Le Roux is the real Satoshi but I added him to the list because there are several theories about him like for other candidates.
It is interesting that he is ex software programmer who created open source disk encryption platform E4M, he was also cartel boss and DEA informant, and I think he is going to stay in the jail for a very long time.

[Renampun]

I laugh every time I think 'is Elon musk a Satoshi', if so why doesn't he tell the truth 'lol'...

...

Wired sure likes to write about criminals and maybe help police catch them like McAfee.

I doubt that Paul Le Roux is the real Satoshi but I added him to the list because there are several theories about him like for other candidates.
It is interesting that he is ex software programmer who created open source disk encryption platform E4M, he was also cartel boss and DEA informant, and I think he is going to stay in the jail for a very long time.

if Paul is a real satoshi then Bitcoin was deliberately created for evil. *btw, regardless of the conspiracy theories that go around, I am already in love with Bitcoin and don't care about anything else

[Lorence.xD]

I find it funny that Hal Finney is in the list of candidates, I mean there is post history of satoshi and Hal about codes, and satoshi is thanking Hal because he complimented his work or something, I didn't bother checking the whole story, my point is if it was Hal then that means that satoshi is a egotistic person that needs the validation of everyone including himself, so in that connection, I believe that Hal is out of the candidates. I don't think that we should be worried about the real identity behind satoshi because it will only be bad for those who are enchanted by the enigma behind the identity, if it was reveal then the magic is lost.

[dkbit98]

Could this be the face of Satoshi Nakamoto?

We may never know for sure, but one theory suggest that one cryptographer Len Sassaman could be the potential candidate for Satoshi.
He was a member of Cypherpunk community and a strong privacy advocate and he worked with Hal Finney on some projects like remailers, with Adam Back on mixmaster, and he worked with with Bram Cohen on Bittorrent project.
Len was active in same time like Satoshi and he committed suicide in July 3, 2011, same year when Satoshi activity stopped, and his obituary can be found on Bitcoin blockchain block 138725

Two months before Len died, Satoshi wrote this:

I’ve moved on to other things and probably won’t be around in the future.

---BEGIN TRIBUTE---
#./BitLen           
:::::::::::::::::::
:::::::.::.::.:.:::
:.: :.' ' ' ' ' : :
:.:'' ,,xiW,"4x, ''
:  ,dWWWXXXXi,4WX, 
' dWWWXXX7"     `X,
 lWWWXX7   __   _ X
:WWWXX7 ,xXX7' "^^X
lWWWX7, _.+,, _.+.,
:WWW7,. `^"-" ,^-' 
 WW",X:        X,   
 "7^^Xl.    _(_x7' 
 l ( :X:       __ _
 `. " XX  ,xxWWWWX7
  )X- "" 4X" .___. 
,W X     :Xi  _,,_ 
WW X      4XiyXWWXd
"" ,,      4XWWWWXX
, R7X,       "^447^
R, "4RXk,      _, ,
TWk  "4RXXi,   X',x
lTWk,  "4RRR7' 4 XH
:lWWWk,  ^"     `4 
::TTXWWi,_  Xll :..
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
LEN "rabbi" SASSAMA
     1980-2011     
https://pastebin.com/raw/BUB3dygQ

At the time when Bitcoin was made Len was in Europe, Belgium that could explain famous 2009 Times newspaper with 'Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks' that was only available in UK and Europe.

We can also find several Bitcointalk posts from 2011 mentioning Len Sassaman:

- A Tribute to Len "rabbi" Sassama
- "BlitCoin": "unmasks one or both ends of a BitCoin transaction"?

We can't ask Len anything now, but his wife Meredith L. Patterson who is also developer is still alive and it would be interesting to hear what she thinks about this theory.

Read very interesting medium post (archive)  written by Leung or Evan Hatch for detailed information.


The truth is out there.

[Innerpumper]

What if 5 more years satoshi nakamoto appeared and properly controlled bitcoin? I myself still do not understand about bitcoin completely. If bitcoin is used to facilitate online transactions. Why would the first person use it for crimes like the dark web, illegal arms sales, illicit goods?

[dkbit98]

What if 5 more years satoshi nakamoto appeared and properly controlled bitcoin? I myself still do not understand about bitcoin completely. If bitcoin is used to facilitate online transactions. Why would the first person use it for crimes like the dark web, illegal arms sales, illicit goods?

What are you mumbling about?
Dollars and other fiat currencies are mostly used for illegal arms sales and illicit goods, and I don't see you and other people complaining about that.
If you don't understand Bitcoin then read and learn more about it and learn that nobody is controlling Bitcoin because it is decentralized, so Satoshi will probably never going to show up and do anything you are speaking about, except maybe in some fantasy movies and novels.

[cabron]

Satoshi Nakamoto changed his birthname to Dorian Nakamoto as said by this guy here in 4.27. Its a very interesting finding actually. Although we have no way of verifying whether its true but there are more details he gives in the video and who are the rest of the candidates. Hal Finney is definitely a good candidate being Satoshi for he is the first person which Satoshi had sent a transaction.

[fladnaG]

But don't you think that if you find Satoshi, you'll ruin his life?

[Wind_FURY]

Didn't Hal Finney already said he had no idea who Satoshi Nakamoto was anymore before he passed away [RIP LEGEND]. He couldn't be talking to himself in those emails.

I may as well say that Elon Musk is the real Doge founder hehe.

The real Satoshi Nakamoto may have been abducted by a Government Agency.

Satoshi made extra steps to hide his true identity. If he needed to do something out of one’s mind like taking to himself in forums, and emailing himself to have proof that “someone else” is Satoshi, I believe he would have done it. It’s for his own, and his family’s protection.

What if 5 more years satoshi nakamoto appeared and properly controlled bitcoin? I myself still do not understand about bitcoin completely. If bitcoin is used to facilitate online transactions. Why would the first person use it for crimes like the dark web, illegal arms sales, illicit goods?

Delete your post, Craig Wright, and his gigs-megs will sue you.

[Skieleton]

Nice investigation! But I'm afraid that there are many hmn counterfeit accounts of this type, although in fact there is an interesting registration date on the forum.
I just wonder what the purpose was to hide my identity ... Usually people with such potential show themselves in public.