Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? A new New York Times survey says it’s Adam Back, sparking wild backlash from the crypto community

The New York Times calls Satoshi Nakamoto a cryptographer, Adam Back, sparking ridicule across the crypto circle. The person involved has denied it, and experts say the evidence is thin. Before any private keys were used, Satoshi Nakamoto’s identity—who holds 7.3 billion USD worth of Bitcoin—remains a mystery.

The New York Times: Satoshi Nakamoto is Adam Back

Who exactly is the “Satoshi Nakamoto” who created Bitcoin? For over 10 years, it has remained a mystery, but yesterday (4/8) the New York Times claimed to have found the answer: Satoshi Nakamoto is the British cryptographer Adam Back.

The author of this report is Pulitzer Prize winner John Carreyrou. He claims it took him 18 months to compare historical posts from more than 130k Cypherpunk email forums, narrow the investigation to a group of 620 early users, and ultimately determine that Adam Back is Satoshi Nakamoto.

The report says that Adam Back proposed as early as 1997 the concept of an electronic cash system that is completely independent of the modern banking system. It includes five core features—such as a distributed network and built-in scarcity—years ahead of Bitcoin’s white paper.

In addition, the Hashcash system invented by Adam Back was directly applied to Bitcoin’s design by Satoshi Nakamoto.

In terms of writing style, Carreyrou’s investigation found that Satoshi Nakamoto and Adam Back both use two full-width spaces after a period, prefer British spelling, and also share the same distinctive mistake in their use of hyphens. The two also often confuse the usage of it’s and its, and use the same obscure technical terminology.

When Satoshi Nakamoto was active online, Adam Back happened to disappear from the community; after Satoshi Nakamoto completely vanished in 2011, Adam Back became active again—like a “never at the same time” phenomenon. Moreover, in an in-person interview in El Salvador, Adam Back once made a slip that appeared to suggest he was admitting his identity.

Source: creativecommons.org British cryptographer, Blockstream CEO Adam Back

Adam Back denies being Satoshi Nakamoto

In response to the New York Times’ conclusion, Adam Back directly denied it. He said he had absolutely never hidden his identity. All the coincidences that others have pointed to stem entirely from the fact that since 1992 he has long focused his research on the practical applications of cryptography, online privacy, and electronic cash.

Because he posted an enormous volume of content on relevant topics in forums, researchers can easily compare his writing with Satoshi Nakamoto’s. In statistics, this is a form of confirmation bias.

Regarding the alleged slip of the tongue during an interview, he clarified that what he said at the time was simply to explain that in the developer forums in the past, he was very talkative. His speaking frequency was far higher than that of other people with the same interests, so it was more likely for him to be identified by similar vocabulary.

Adam Back reiterated that he himself also does not know who Satoshi Nakamoto’s true identity is, and keeping Satoshi Nakamoto anonymous is very beneficial to Bitcoin’s overall development.

Source: Adam Back/X Adam Back denies being Satoshi Nakamoto

The crypto community ridicules the NYT report

Besides Adam Back, the crypto community and multiple industry experts also raised doubts about the investigative report.

Bitwise Asset Management’s CEO Teddy Fusaro scoffed at it as well. He questioned how Satoshi Nakamoto could possibly go and partner with the Wall Street firm Cantor Fitzgerald to set up a Bitcoin reserve company.

Jan3 CEO and Bitcoin fanatic Samson Mow also quoted a line from “The Big Short” to mock it: “Look at him—that’s my quantitative analyst,” and in a subsequent post wrote: “We’re all Satoshi Nakamoto, except Craig Wright.”

Bloomberg columnist Joe Weisenthal also noted that the New York Times’ evidence based on stylistic analysis is rather weak, and even hyphenation habits can be changed. Moreover, members of the early Cypherpunk community originally held political views that were extremely similar to the network architecture and privacy concerns, so overlap in text and ideas is very normal.

Early Bitcoin participant Nicholas Gregory also said that based on his past experiences interacting privately, he completely does not believe that Adam Back is Satoshi Nakamoto. He added that the media’s constant attempts to uncover Satoshi Nakamoto’s identity is very dangerous and could expose him and his family to personal safety threats.

Blockchain analytics platform Arkham estimates that Satoshi Nakamoto currently holds about 1.1 million Bitcoin, with a total value as high as 73 billion USD.

More and more “top contenders”—who is Satoshi Nakamoto?

Over the past 17 years, outsiders have repeatedly speculated about Satoshi Nakamoto’s true identity, leading to many popular candidates.

The most frequently mentioned figures include the late cryptographer Hal Finney, computer scientist Nick Szabo, and the late software engineer Len Sassaman. Hal Finney was the recipient of the first Bitcoin transaction; he died in 2014 from ALS. Len Sassaman died in 2011.

In October 2024, a documentary released by HBO also tried to solve the puzzle, concluding that Satoshi Nakamoto is the Canadian software developer Peter Todd—though the person involved was also strongly denied it.

• **Related report:**HBO Bitcoin documentary airs! Is Satoshi Nakamoto Peter Todd? The person denies it with these words

No matter how many inferences the media and documentaries make, as long as no one can sign messages or transfer funds using the private keys from early blocks, all the evidence can only count as circumstantial evidence. Who exactly is this mysterious figure holding 1.1 million Bitcoin is still the biggest unresolved mystery in modern technology and financial history.

Further reading:
Satoshi Nakamoto’s payment dream changes course! From Bitcoin to stablecoins—why crypto payments are becoming a subsidiary of banks?