Who invented Bitcoin? A London court to decide

An Australian computer scientist named Craig Wright, 53, is currently on trial in London, asserting that he is “Satoshi Nakamoto,” the pseudonym used by the elusive creator of Bitcoin and the author of the seminal 2008 white paper that first introduced the cryptocurrency. This is not the first instance of someone being identified as the mysterious inventor of Bitcoin.

Wright is facing a lawsuit from cryptocurrency activists, accusing him of lying and forging documents to support his claim of being the founder of Bitcoin. The Crypto Open Patent Alliance (COPA), which counts among its members Jack Dorsey’s Block (formerly Square), is pressing London’s High Court to declare that Wright is not the real Satoshi.

COPA argues that Wright has failed to provide any concrete evidence of his claim, alleging that he has engaged in the repeated forgery of documents to bolster his assertion, a charge Wright refutes. During the court proceedings, COPA’s lawyer, Jonathan Hough, described Wright’s claim as “a brazen lie,” underpinned by “an elaborate false narrative supported by forgery on an industrial scale.” Hough also highlighted instances of Wright’s conduct that he deemed ludicrous, including alleged uses of ChatGPT to create forgeries.

Bitcoin, which Wright claims to have created, has since its inception risen to become the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, currently valued at US$880 billion, according to Coingecko. Despite its founder, Satoshi Nakamoto, ceasing communication with fellow developers and vanishing around 2011, Bitcoin’s popularity and value have continued to grow, fueling ongoing speculation and theories about Nakamoto’s true identity.