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SodiumBenzoate · Dec 9, 2015

http://gizmodo.com/this-australian-says-he-and-his-dead-friend-invented-bi-1746958692

It's a *very* long article and there is a ton in it, but the most convincing piece of evidence is this paragraph:

The hacker also provided a PDF file of what appears to be an unfinished draft of a legal contract between Wright and Kleiman forming a secret Bitcoin trust in the Seychelles, a notorious tax haven in the Indian Ocean. The contract shows Dave Kleiman in receipt of 1,100,111 bitcoin, to be repaid to Craig Wright on January 1, 2020. Several reports, including an oft-cited technical analysis by Bitcoin expert Sergio Demian Lerner, estimate Satoshi Nakamoto’s legendary Bitcoin fortune at around 1 million BTC — a figure that nearly matches the amount in the Seychelles trust. It also lists five PGP keys — files that are used to establish encrypted lines of communication over email — that will be used to manage the trust. Searching for those keys in a public database reveals that one belongs to Wright, one belongs to Kleiman, and two belong to Satoshi Nakamoto.

...and in true Gawker fashion, Craig Wright's home address is published in the article without redaction. Stay classy, Gawker.
(edit: If you were wondering why the post title is really awkward, my original title said "Gizmodo/Gawker", to draw more attention to the "Gawker is a horrible company" angle. Since Wired also broke this story pretty much simultaneously the mods fairly edited the title.)

And now one of the craziest modern mysteries is (probably) solved. Kind of disappointing, honestly.

Aurongel · Dec 9, 2015

...forming a secret Bitcoin trust in the Seychelles

Reading the entire article now...

SodiumBenzoate · Dec 9, 2015

http://www.wired.com/2015/12/bitcoi...o-is-probably-this-unknown-australian-genius/

WIRED also has an article up.

Not sure who gets the "broke the story" credit, because I'm not sure of the time zones. For me, Gawker says 6:01 and WIRED says 4:25.

NotTheGuyYouKill · Dec 9, 2015

Gawker solving an actual mystery is the most shocking part of all this.

Mr. Tone · Dec 9, 2015

NotTheGuyYouKill said:
Gawker solving an actual mystery is the most shocking part of all this.

Apparently Wired and Gizmodo both had stuff leaked to them, I wonder if any other outlets did as well?

Maintenance · Dec 9, 2015

Dude is fucked.

A.D. Skinner · Dec 9, 2015

Who, what?

Edit

I guess I meant my initial post was more of a "how was someones identity a mystery"

j_k_redtail · Dec 9, 2015

Welp. I totally thought Newsweek was right, and posted as such on this forum. Where do I collect my serving of crow?

BraXzy · Dec 9, 2015

/r/OutOfTheLoop pls?

infiniteloop · Dec 9, 2015

who is that?

ah "Bitcoin’s Creator". ok.

thought he made a final fantasy or something.

wenis · Dec 9, 2015

So what happens to him now that his identity is out there?

THRILLH0 · Dec 9, 2015

A.D. Skinner said:
Who, what?

BraXzy said:
/r/OutOfTheLoop pls?

infiniteloop said:
who is that?

First line of the article. Quality posts right here.

Ran rp · Dec 9, 2015

He died broke and in squalor, after suffering from infected bedsores. His body was found decomposing and surrounded by empty alcohol bottles and a loaded handgun. Bloody feces was tracked along the floor, and a bullet hole was found in his mattress, though no spent shell casings were found on the scene.

akira28 · Dec 9, 2015

wenis said:
So what happens to him now that his identity is out there?

kidnapping and beating him like a pinata until bitcoins spill out

infiniteloop · Dec 9, 2015

THRILLH0 said:
First line of the article.

"The hacker also provided a PDF file of what appears to be an unfinished draft of a legal contract between Wright and Kleiman forming a secret Bitcoin trust in the Seychelles, a notorious tax haven in the Indian Ocean."

Nope.

Be nice to have a bit of context in the OP.

THRILLH0 · Dec 9, 2015

infiniteloop said:
"The hacker also provided a PDF file of what appears to be an unfinished draft of a legal contract between Wright and Kleiman forming a secret Bitcoin trust in the Seychelles, a notorious tax haven in the Indian Ocean."

Nope.

Be nice to have a bit of context in the OP.

Uh yep:

the article in the OP said:
A monthlong Gizmodo investigation has uncovered compelling and perplexing new evidence in the search for Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous creator of Bitcoin.

Mimosa97 · Dec 9, 2015

So how much money are we talking about ?

jellies_two · Dec 9, 2015

Its a long and tortuous article that, as its source is hacked inboxes, is quite confusing.

It sounds like Klieman (now dead) was the computer brains, and his brother (not talking to the press yet) has the keys to a large stash, while Wright obviously has a lot as well and was very closely involved. Maybe Wright was the architect, and Klieman the programmer. It seems pretty clear that Wright was the voice of Satoshi.

Bitcoin price jumped today to over $400 so if there is one or two pots of a million BTC that's half a billion to a billion on paper. Of course it can't be liquidated without crashing the market.

Its interesting that Wright hates the Australian Tax Office or at least someone in it - sooner or later the story has to come out there. Clearly he objected to the ruling that BTC was to be taxed on appreciation as it torpedoes whatever plans he had to use his stash the way he wanted to. Whats cool is a billion, sure, but what is cooler is 100 billion, ya know.

jellies_two · Dec 9, 2015

Found him in 2014 jumping on the replies to a bitcoin article, in the comments section (joining the dots here), defending his creation.

https://bitslog.wordpress.com/2013/06/26/the-bitcoin-eternal-choice-for-the-dark-side-attack-ecdsa/
and here again:
http://blog.erratasec.com/2013/04/a-wonkish-look-at-bitcoin-economics.html#.VmePQOOGRBc

defending it more vociferously.

onadesertedisland · Dec 9, 2015

Bitcoiners are fun to listen to.

Jaladinozozo · Dec 9, 2015

onadesertedisland said:
Bitcoiners are fun to listen to.

https://www.coinbase.com/charts

THRILLH0 · Dec 9, 2015

Welp, his home has just been raided by the Australian Federal Police.

Sadsic · Dec 9, 2015

THRILLH0 said:
Welp, his home has just been raided by the Australian Federal Police.

why?

Timeless · Dec 9, 2015

Does NeoGAF have a rule against doxxing?

wonzo · Dec 9, 2015

Sadsic said:
why?

tax avoidance lmfao

CPS2 · Dec 9, 2015

wonzo said:
tax avoidance lmfao

We hear you invented a new currency and stashed yourself a few hundred million dollars worth. So we decided to invent some taxation rules to apply to your invention. Give us... um... half.

weshes195 · Dec 9, 2015

I am confused? What is bitcoin? Looking it up online looks like there were partners in this creation so it probably is legal, so why would people be out to get this person?

Like I said, never heard of Bitcoin. It was too confusing to understand when I googled it. Any one wanna help out an idiot?

ryseing · Dec 9, 2015

weshes195 said:
I am confused? What is bitcoin? Looking it up online looks like there were partners in this creation so it probably is legal, so why would people be out to get this person?

Like I said, never heard of Bitcoin. It was too confusing to understand when I googled it. Any one wanna help out an idiot?

Imaginary Internet money.

This video explains it better than I can.

Mr. Tone · Dec 9, 2015

THRILLH0 said:
Welp, his home has just been raided by the Australian Federal Police.

Linked

CPS2 · Dec 9, 2015

weshes195 said:
I am confused? What is bitcoin? Looking it up online looks like there were partners in this creation so it probably is legal, so why would people be out to get this person?

Like I said, never heard of Bitcoin. It was too confusing to understand when I googled it. Any one wanna help out an idiot?

Imagine a p2p network like bittorrent, but instead of file sharing what they do is keep a ledger of transactions for an anonymous online currency. The network confirms transactions and makes sure they're legit, so you don't pay someone and still get to keep the money.

Fusebox · Dec 9, 2015

THRILLH0 said:
Welp, his home has just been raided by the Australian Federal Police.

Source??

krackerjack · Dec 9, 2015

Aaaand it's up to $418

fertygo · Dec 9, 2015

ryseing said:
Imaginary Internet money.

This video explains it better than I can.

Is that dude on video spoke... english?

ryseing · Dec 9, 2015

fertygo said:
Is that dude on video spoke... english?

It's a Clickhole (The Onion) video.

FLEABttn · Dec 9, 2015

weshes195 said:
I am confused? What is bitcoin? Looking it up online looks like there were partners in this creation so it probably is legal, so why would people be out to get this person?

Like I said, never heard of Bitcoin. It was too confusing to understand when I googled it. Any one wanna help out an idiot?

It's WoW gold for people who like useless math, wasting electricity, pump and dumps, anarcho capitalism, and tulip bubbles.

seldead · Dec 9, 2015

CPS2 said:
We hear you invented a new currency and stashed yourself a few hundred million dollars worth. So we decided to invent some taxation rules to apply to your invention. Give us... um... half.

His profits from it are capital gains in the ATO's eyes. Why should bitcoin investors not be held in the same light as any other type? Its tax fraud

criesofthepast · Dec 9, 2015

Fun article but not sure it really is him. Most in the community think it isn't.

I've been slowly increasing the amount of coins I own (litecoin and bitcoin) and cashing out a bit every few months or so for a few years. I'm playing around with pure profits so nothing to lose. I've made almost 10k in profit since it all started and have about that much still in coins at today's value, so not really pretend internet money.

jellies_two · Dec 9, 2015

Poor guy, hope his lawyers can get well paid offshore.

Presumably since his bitcoin was treated as an asset, the ATO wanted to charge him income tax on its paper appreciation? I don't know. He can make the argument that the valuation is not real because if he was to sell it, it would not be worth what it is supposedly worth -- as he'd be selling 10% of all the BTC in existence. Anyway the plot thickens.

meanwhile the bitcoin community are probably thankful that now he is shown to be just an academic, not the NSA or something sinister, BTC is free from him and his shadow and can continue without looking over its shoulder.

injurai · Dec 9, 2015

Someone call David Fincher.

Jaladinozozo · Dec 9, 2015

FLEABttn said:
It's WoW gold for people who like useless math, wasting electricity, pump and dumps, anarcho capitalism, and tulip bubbles.

WoW gold? Useless math? Maybe you should learn how encryption works and how useless the math is when you log into a site like GAF or your bank account and learn what that little lock symbol is and what digital signatures are.

Also $6.3 billion market cap with an average of $200 million in 24 hour transactions = WoW gold and waste of electricity? Ok then.

x3sphere · Dec 9, 2015

The Newsweek story was pure rubbish, but this actually sounds convincing.

SodiumBenzoate · Dec 9, 2015

FLEABttn said:
It's WoW gold for people who like useless math, wasting electricity, pump and dumps, anarcho capitalism, and tulip bubbles.

Holy shit, this is the best definition of Bitcoin I have ever seen. (beyond "Dogecoin is just like Bitcoin, except Dogecoin actually treats itself as seriously as Bitcoin deserves to be treated" which is a bit inside baseball)

Jaladinozozo said:
WoW gold? Useless math? Maybe you should learn how encryption works and how useless the math is when you log into a site like GAF or your bank account and learn what that little lock symbol is and what digital signatures are.

Also $6.3 billion market cap with an average of $200 million in 24 hour transactions = WoW gold and waste of electricity? Ok then.

found the true believer

jmood88 · Dec 9, 2015

Edit: I misread

Edit 2: no I didn't. So what's up with the fake Japanese name?

Jaladinozozo · Dec 9, 2015

SodiumBenzoate said:
Holy shit, this is the best definition of Bitcoin I have ever seen. (beyond "Dogecoin is just like Bitcoin, except Dogecoin actually treats itself as seriously as Bitcoin deserves to be treated" which is a bit inside baseball)

Too bad most of wall street and 1 Billion in VC funding for Bitcoin startups raised since 2014 says otherwise with even major banks jumping onboard.

Jaladinozozo · Dec 9, 2015

SodiumBenzoate said:
Holy shit, this is the best definition of Bitcoin I have ever seen. (beyond "Dogecoin is just like Bitcoin, except Dogecoin actually treats itself as seriously as Bitcoin deserves to be treated" which is a bit inside baseball)

found the true believer

You live in your own small little world don't you? I am gonna assume you are either right out of high school or have a limited understanding of most of the things you comment on. (other than video games and porn)

Also your OP is complete BS, this guy is definitely NOT Satoshi

Mr. Tone · Dec 9, 2015

Jaladinozozo said:
Also your OP is complete BS, this guy is definitely NOT Satoshi

Got any evidence? Or just more condescending bullshit?

kabel · Dec 9, 2015

jmood88 said:
Edit 2: no I didn't. So what's up with the fake Japanese name?

To confuse you.

Or it just sounds cool.

jellies_two · Dec 9, 2015

Jaladinozozo said:
Also your OP is complete BS, this guy is definitely NOT Satoshi

Why?
The ATO is involved, accountants and lawyers are involved, it would be too difficult to fake all this stuff. Everyone peripherally involved is either putting down phones or not denying it.

What facts support the counter side of the argument.
Other than he is quite definitely human, and has failings.

BTW, I understand BTC and the economy around it, it isn't smoke and mirrors or a joke.

SodiumBenzoate · Dec 9, 2015

Jaladinozozo said:
You live in your own small little world don't you? I am gonna assume you are either right out of high school or have a limited understanding of most of the things you comment on. (other than video games and porn)

Also your OP is complete BS, this guy is definitely NOT Satoshi

1. My OP (and post #3, which is a second independent, reputable source which came to the same conclusion) is linking to a very long, thorough, and heavily researched article. None of the facts or arguments in that article are my own, nor do I claim that they are.

2. Thanks for the "you're an ignorant child" and "you're a pathetic nerd who only cares about video games and porn" comments! I'm flattered. Glad you went straight to a functional equivalent of Godwin's Law, so we don't have to spend 25 back-and-forth posts and 3 days of wasted time to get there. Good thing I didn't make this post before you made full Member.

Jaladinozozo said:
https://www.coinbase.com/charts

http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=aig#{"range":"10y","allowChartStacking":true}

Jaladinozozo · Dec 9, 2015

Satoshi is not one person

If it was this person, they purposely planted things overtime that would lead to them being discovered? Why? After all these years since 2009?

This seems like a hoax and I think in the coming weeks we will see that.

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