Introduction: Why the “Satoshi mystery” is still alive
The search query “who is Satoshi Nakamoto” has not faded for more than 15 years—not because the world craves another sensation, but because Bitcoin is a rare case where the creator’s anonymity is directly tied to the resilience of the system itself. If the identity were revealed, Bitcoin would become vulnerable not technically, but politically, legally, and historically.
It is important to fix one thing from the start:
the question is not “which single person,” but “what intellectual environment and whose interests Bitcoin emerged from.”
1. Before Bitcoin: a hidden line of continuity that is rarely discussed
Hashcash — not just anti-spam
Hashcash (Adam Back) is usually mentioned as a “predecessor of Proof of Work.” That is a superficial take. A lesser-known fact:
Hashcash was originally considered an element of an anti-censorship economy—making mass attacks and large-scale control economically expensive.
In early discussions on the cypherpunks mailing list, PoW was viewed as a political instrument, not merely a computational puzzle.
👉 Bitcoin uses PoW not to “secure the network,” but to forcibly distribute power. This is a radically cypherpunk idea, not a purely engineering one.
Argument FOR a cypherpunk connection:
This interpretation of PoW is almost nowhere found outside the cypherpunk community.
Argument AGAINST:
PoW could have been reinterpreted by anyone with access to the mailing list archives (they were public).
b-money: a project that “failed,” but provided the skeleton
b-money (Wei Dai) is often described as an “unfinished experiment.” That framing is incorrect. A lesser-known detail:
b-money already contained ideas of contracts, reputation, and collective balance tracking.
It lacked only one thing: a solution to state synchronization without trust.
Bitcoin essentially fixes one very specific hole in b-money—the consensus problem.
Argument FOR involvement of people from the b-money circle:
The fix is too precise, as if the author deeply understood exactly why b-money did not work.
Argument AGAINST:
Wei Dai publicly denied involvement and stated that he was unaware of the project before Satoshi’s email.
Bit Gold: uncomfortably close
Nick Szabo’s Bit Gold is the most inconvenient fact for the “random lone genius” theory.
Rarely mentioned:
Szabo described chains of proofs, timestamps, and the “cost of computation” long before BTC.
His writings contain the idea that money is a history of expenditure, not an obligation of the state.
Bitcoin differs from Bit Gold not in philosophy, but in implementation.
Argument FOR Nick Szabo = Satoshi:
- Near-complete conceptual overlap
- Shared interest in Austrian economics
- Similar phrasing in texts—not just stylometry, but the logic of argumentation
Argument AGAINST:
- Szabo is too publicly visible as a thinker
- He never showed interest in maintaining and supporting software, while Satoshi clearly did
2. Hal Finney: a figure either underestimated or overestimated
A well-known fact: Finney received the first Bitcoin transaction.
Less well-known facts:
- He was one of the few people capable of verifying the correctness of Bitcoin’s implementation in the very early days
- His RPoW project was a practical attempt to create a scarce digital asset, not just theory
A suspicious detail that is rarely discussed:
Finney lived in the same city as a man named Dorian Nakamoto (a fact). There is no evidence of a connection—but the coincidence is hard to ignore.
Arguments FOR:
- Technical competence
- Ideological alignment
- Participation from day one
Arguments AGAINST:
- His coding and communication style differs from Satoshi’s
- He appeared more like the perfect first user than the architect of the entire system
3. Satoshi as a collective: the version people are afraid to discuss
Why do people almost always search for a single individual? Because a myth is easier that way.
Little-noticed signs of collective work:
- Early Bitcoin code contains different programming styles
- Some architectural decisions look like compromises between schools of thought
- Satoshi disappeared precisely when the project became self-sustaining—typical for a group, not a lone individual
Arguments FOR:
- An unusually broad skill set: cryptography, networking, economics, game theory
- “Satoshi” never wrote about personal motives—only about the system
Arguments AGAINST:
- No leaks, no conflicts, no coordination failures
- For a group, the discipline of anonymity is almost too perfect
4. The intelligence-agency theory: don’t dismiss it, but don’t believe it blindly
It is popular to say “this is nonsense.” From a research perspective, that is incorrect.
Arguments FOR:
- The NSA published work on cryptographic chains long before BTC
- Bitcoin enables transparent financial analysis (blockchain analytics)
- Weakening national currencies can be a geopolitical instrument
Arguments AGAINST:
- Open-source code with no backdoors
- Lost early coins (≈1 million BTC)—extremely strange for a state entity
- Complete loss of control over the network
Interim conclusion:
If government specialists were involved at all, it was not as a state project, but as personal intellectual work.
5. The “cypherpunks later forced to work for the state” theory
One of the most marginal, yet curious, versions.
FOR:
- Some cypherpunks did later work with corporations and governments
- Satoshi’s disappearance coincided with increased regulatory attention
AGAINST:
- No evidence of coercion
- Disappearing forever is far too radical—and unnecessary—for “cooperation”
6. The most underestimated version: Satoshi as an idea, not a person
Rarely discussed, but important:
Bitcoin may have been deliberately designed so that the author question would be secondary.
Anonymity is part of the protocol, not an accident.
From this perspective, the question “who is Satoshi?” is a trap.
The far more important question is: why did the system survive its creator?
Interim summary (without conclusions)
- All technical roots lead back to the cypherpunk movement
- No version has definitive proof
- Every hypothesis has strengths and weaknesses
- Bitcoin is the result of idea evolution, not a sudden revelation
I deliberately draw no conclusions.
This article is a map of arguments, not a verdict.
To be continued in the next article.
