CONFERENCE PRESENTER: So without further ado, the wizard of Oz is going to take us through the history of bitcoin. Enjoy guys and welcome to the day.
HAGAR COHEN, REPORTER: At this bitcoin conference, the inventor of the cryptocurrency is the stuff of legend.
CONFERENCE PRESENTER: We don’t know anything about Satoshi or very little. We don’t know whether he was a man, whether they were a woman or whether they were a group.
HAGAR COHEN: Satoshi Nakamoto is the mysterious online personality who in 2008 first published the ‘White Paper’ – the blueprint behind bitcoin.
Why is this piece of work making you so emotional?
CHRIS PAVLESIC, CONFERENCE ORGANISER: Because it levels the playing field for all 8 billion people on Earth.
You know, we come from a dog-eat-dog world where it’s me versus you, it’s how do I get a step ahead? It’s a rat race, right? All the classic cliches whereas bitcoin levels the playing field, everyone can read the rulebook.
HAGAR COHEN: For years, bitcoiners the world over tried to uncover Satoshi’s real-life identity.
CHRIS PAVLESIC: Part of me thinks I would love to know, the other part of me thinks, I think it might be better we don’t know. Because there is no leader, it’s a faceless movement.
HAGAR COHEN: One of the potential Satoshi candidates was Australian computer scientist, Dr Craig Wright.
DR CRAIG WRIGHT (2023): I did a few degrees first of all in information technology and computer science …
HAGAR COHEN: Wright had worked as a university academic and for an accounting firm, before entering the crypto industry.
In late 2015, the tax office raided his Sydney home over suspicions he’d falsely claimed $3 million in tax.
He denies the allegations.
It was around the same time Wright began to claim he was the real Satoshi.
BBC REPORTER: So you’re going to show me that Satoshi Nakamoto is you?
CRAIG WRIGHT: Yes. Some people will believe, some people won’t and to tell you the truth, I don’t really care.
BBC REPORTER: But you can say, hand on heart to me, I am Satoshi Nakamoto.
CRAIG WRIGHT: I was the main part of it, other people helped me.
HAGAR COHEN: The tax fraud investigation was never resolved as Dr Wright left Australia, settling in London.
He went on to launch a new cryptocurrency called Bitcoin Satoshi Vision, which he promotes off the back of his claim to be the real Satoshi Nakamoto.
PETER MCCORMACK, PODCASTER: Since Craig Wright arrived in London, he has been on a campaign of litigation against people who have published the White Paper. He’s sued people who said he isn’t Satoshi. He sued exchanges for copyright infringement for using the word bitcoin.
HAGAR COHEN: Podcaster Peter McCormack was among those Craig Wright sued for defamation over a series of tweets published in 2019.
PETER MCCORMACK: I decided to call Craig Wright out on Twitter. So I said he’s not Satoshi, he’s a lying fraud.
I was quite naïve about it. I didn’t realise this would be a five-year lawsuit that would cost millions of pounds.
HAGAR COHEN: A High Court judge in London ruled Craig Wright was defamed by McMormack’s tweets but also made damning findings about Wright’s conduct.
PETER MCCORMACK: He claimed he was disinvited from conferences, and he couldn’t become a pastor and then he was very anxious about picking his kids up from school. It was all made up.
He essentially perjured himself and so the judge granted him a one-pound judgement. So that’s the smallest judgement he can give for somebody in a libel claim.
HAGAR COHEN: Then in 2021, a consortium of crypto businesses scattered across the globe also mounted a case against Wright.
California-based cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase was one of them.
PETER GREWAL, CHIEF LEGAL OFFICER, COINBASE: We sought to establish through a legal process and ultimately a final legal judgment, that one fact above all else is true about cryptocurrency and digital assets and that fact is this – Craig Wright is not Satoshi Nakamoto.
HAGAR COHEN: Former Facebook vice president Paul Grewal is now Coinbase’s general counsel.
PETER GREWAL: This has not just been a campaign of litigation, it’s been a campaign of intimidation, bullying, and threats that have worked to discourage good faith actors who support bitcoin and all the principles underneath it.
HAGAR COHEN: Part of the evidence submitted by Wright’s team, turned out to be forged.
PETER GREWAL: I’ve never seen such a clear-cut example of a scorched earth litigation campaign, relying upon such fraudulent representations and forged documents.
HAGAR COHEN: In a surprise outcome this month, a London judge ruled that:
Craig Wright did not author the White Paper. That he is not Satoshi Nakamato and Wright didn’t create the bitcoin system or the initial software.
Craig Wright did not respond to our interview request or written questions. On social media he said that he intends to consider his options for appeal.
PETER GREWAL: Anyone working on the bitcoin protocol, whether they may be a software developer here in the United States, or a cryptocurrency podcaster in the UK, can know with certainty that they need not fear that they may face damages, or even potentially jail time as a result of these bogus allegations.
That’s a big win for the cryptocurrency community. It’s a big win for all of us who care about the rule of law, and, frankly, truth.
HAGAR COHEN: The digital asset market is known for its wild price fluctuations but for bitcoiners, its decentralised nature and little oversight are a big attraction.
CONFERENCE PRESENTER: Bitcoin did not come out of nowhere.
HAGAR COHEN: For many at this conference, the High Court ruling that Wright is not Satoshi, comes as no surprise.
VOX POP: There’s sort of a joke now that everyone is Satoshi but now it’s except for Craig Wright.
VOX POP 2: We pretty much knew in the first 24 hours that he wasn’t him, and it was a fraud.
PETER MCCORMACK: What does he do now? He has no credibility in the cryptocurrency world, he’ll have very little credibility in the technology world.
I’m fascinated by him. I want to interview him. I want to ask him what he’s doing next.
