One of the most famous and important names in the history of cryptocurrency is, perhaps fittingly, a complete mystery, one that has shaped the world of crypto and the conversion platforms that provide it with liquidity ever since.
The pseudonymous Satoshi Nakamoto has been a legendary figure in the world of crypto, with both the development of crypto and his mysterious disappearance barely a year after solving the biggest problem that had held cryptocurrency back for two decades.
His solutions to the problem of double spending, the distributed ledger and proof-of-work verification, became the backbone for crypto as a whole, and Mr Nakamoto’s influence is still felt in the culture of Web3 as a whole.
However, the question of his identity has always lingered, and a New York Times investigation claims to have found the answer.
Are they correct? Does it matter who created Bitcoin? And what does the revelation of this mystery mean for people who use the tokens every day?
Why Does Satoshi Nakamoto Matter To Crypto?
Whilst the foundations for cryptocurrency began with David Chaum’s early developments in digital cash, Satoshi Nakamoto is the reason why cryptocurrency exists today.
Whilst Mr Nakamoto did not invent any of the technologies that would be used in Bitcoin, he was the person to realise that proof-of-work verification was the missing link that could make David Chaum’s centralised cryptocurrency function as a decentralised financial market.
He was also a driver of the early ethos of crypto; the genesis block featured an article about the UK Chancellor bailing out banks during the global financial crisis, and this anarchic spirit led to several of the technical decisions now characteristic of crypto.
Very little is known about him, but clues have been pieced together, suggesting potential motives for developing the currency, and the rampant speculation has reached a point that Mr Nakamoto largely left the community in 2010 in part due to attempts to unmask them.
After 16 years of dormancy, an investigative journalist claims to have the answer.
Who Does The New York Times Claim Is Satoshi Nakamoto?
In April 2026, John Carreyrou, the investigative journalist who revealed the scope of the Theranos fraud, published an article for the New York Times alleging that the identity of Satoshi Nakamoto is a computer scientist from London called Adam Back.
In 1997, Adam Back invented Hashcash, a spam filter which used proof-of-work verification and became a core part of Bitcoin, whilst part of the Cypherpunks, an anarchist community focused on cryptography as a means to resist centralised authority, surveillance states and attacks on individual privacy.
Whilst Mr Back immediately denied the claims as just a coincidence, Mr Carreyrou had several justifications for thinking it was Mr Back:
- The Genesis Block used the day’s headline from The Times, a British newspaper.
- Both Mr Back and Mr Nakamoto appeared familiar with the Cypherpunks.
- Mr Back, Mr Nakamoto and the Cypherpunks were all focused on the goal of creating electronic cash.
- Both Mr Back and Mr Nakamoto use similar off-hand comments in their posts and emails, with AI language analysis finding a further connection.
- Mr Back went dormant whilst Mr Nakamoto was regularly posting and vice versa.
- Both were extremely preoccupied with spam and network security.
- Both released their most famous technology under open source licenses.
- Mr Beck allegedly spoke as if he were Mr Nakamoto during a Bitcoin conference in El Salvador.
Who Else Has Been Accused Of Being Satoshi Nakamoto?
Whilst Mr Carreyrou’s investigation was comprehensive, it was not definitive; it relies on a lot of circumstantial evidence, and he is just the latest of over a hundred people who people have claimed is Satoshi Nakamoto.
It is uncertain whether Satoshi Nakamoto is an individual pseudonym or part of a group of people, whether he is Japanese, British or even male.
Here are some of the most notable candidates outside of Adam Back.
Hal Finney
The first person to receive Bitcoin, Hal Finney was a pioneer in cryptography who lived close to a man called Satoshi Nakamoto and had a similar writing style to the pseudonymous Bitcoin creator.
However, later analysis and plausible deniability have caused some people to believe it is not him, although his influence on the world of cryptocurrency is clear.
Dorian Nakamoto
Born Satoshi Nakamoto, Dorian Nakamoto is a Japanese American who lived in California, was a libertarian and worked as a systems engineer for financial services companies.
He has also denied all claims that he is Satoshi, and the Newsweek report where his name was suggested has since been criticised ethically and methodologically.
Nick Szabo
Nick Szabo was one of the earliest enthusiasts of cryptocurrency, having written about the early era of digital currencies and citing himself, Wei Dai and Hal Finney as the only people who believed in the concept.
However, there is no proof outside of circumstantial evidence.
Other Candidates Claimed To Be Satoshi Nakamoto
- Craig Wright – An Australian academic who claimed to be Mr Nakamoto but was later imprisoned for fabricating evidence to substantiate this claim.
- Vili Lehdonvirta and Michael Clear – Two students from Trinity College Dublin, the latter of whom studied cryptography.
- Neal King, Vladimir Oksman and Charles Bry – All three were named on an encryption patent cited by Satoshi Nakamoto, although all three denied it.
- Shinichi Mochizuki – Japanese mathematician.
- Ross Ulbricht – Owner of the dark web marketplace The Silk Road.
- David Chaum – Pioneer of cryptocurrency.
- Len Sassaman – An early advocate for cryptocurrency who was memorialised on the blockchain.