Britcoin theory: British nerd Adam Back denies being Bitcoin inventor Satoshi Nakamoto in $2 trillion mystery

Claims British computer scientist Adam Back is the secret inventor of Bitcoin are compelling, but likely wrong, according to cryptocurrency experts.

Last week The New York Times investigative reporter John Carreyrou claimed he’d solved the biggest mystery in tech by outing 55-year-old Mr Back as the man who created the $US1.4 trillion ($2 trillion) digital currency to own an alleged $US80 billion fortune.

Mr Carreyrou pored over emails and forum posts sent by Bitcoin’s pseudonymous founder Satoshi Nakamoto to conclude that it was Mr Back who invented Bitcoin in 2009.

Mr Back denies the claims and said the evidence presented by Mr Carreyrou is a mix of coincidence and confirmation bias as the journalist used select information to support a pre-existing belief.

“I’m not Satoshi, but I was early in laser focus on the positive societal implications of cryptography, online privacy and electronic cash,” Mr Back said on X.

British connections

Still, there’s solid evidence that points to the inventor being British like Mr Back. Bitcoin’s inventor embedded a January 3, 2009, financial headline from UK paper, The Times, in Bitcoin’s first ever block to timestamp the online currency’s launch.

Emails written by Satoshi Nakamoto also use the British-style spelling of colour rather than the Americanised “color” and optimise instead of “optimize”.

Satoshi also used the British expletive “bloody” on a Bitcoin talk forum when complaining of how hard it was to explain his invention to a general audience. Mr Back also used the expletive in a 1998 post to express his irritation with internet banner ads, Mr Carreryou said.

This suggests Satoshi was unlikely North American and probably British, or heavily influenced by the UK’s culture.

Mr Back is one of a handful of Brits known to have communicated with Satoshi as a member of online chat group Cypherpunks and invented the Hashcash cryptographic algorithm in 1997.

According to Mr Carreyrou, Mr Back also wrote in a September 1996 blog post: “I’m better at coding, than constructing convincing arguments.”

While Satsohi wrote in a 2008 blog post: “I’m better with code than with words though.”

Moreover, Mr Carreyrou said he used AI and a professional linguistics or stylometry expert to compare Mr Back’s writing style to that of Satoshi. Both tests concluded the two were highly likely the same author and ahead of 532 other candidates linked to Satoshi.

“Mr. Back did agree with me about some things,” wrote Mr Carreyrou. “He acknowledged that he had the right background and skill set to be Satoshi. And he agreed that Satoshi was British, older than 50 and likely a member of the Cypherpunks.”

But Mr Back has pointed to 2008 emails between himself and Satoshi as evidence that the two were connected, but separate. He also points to written evidence suggesting he was still learning about Bitcoin in 2013.

Experts doubt Mr Back is Satoshi

One Australian crypto industry leader who declined to be named, as his company is in a sensitive capital markets deal, said Mr Carreryrou had made a compelling argument, albeit likely wrong.

“The journalist has done a really good piece, but I think the reality is that while the English used in the Bitcoin white paper might reflect on an Englishman like Mr Back, the computer code published is inconsistent with what Mr Back used. Satoshi published not just a white paper, but also a code that doesn’t match what Back used.

“So, I think the unfortunate reality is that who invented Bitcoin is still the greatest mystery in tech.”

Other amateur sleuths point to the US government agency the National Security Agency (NSA) as its inventor given it has deep expertise in cryptography and a secretive nature.

But most experts centre around the theory that Satoshi was a private individual and likely a member of the Cypherpunk tech and libertarian movement at the time.

“It’s not Adam Back,” said Martin Rogers a Bitcoin supporter and founder of venture capital firm KTM Ventures. “The styles of (computer) programming are different from what Adam writes to what Satoshi wrote.

“I think it was (American) Hal Finney and he died of ALS 12 years ago.”

If Satoshi is still alive he could signal it to the world by moving any of the 1.1 million Bitcoins sitting in his online wallet. Many though think that’s unlikely to ever happen.