Adam Back is the alleged "father of bitcoin." What is known

The New York Times published an investigation in which it named Adam Back, a British cryptographer and head of Blockstream, as the possible creator of bitcoin, hiding under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto. Beck himself categorically denies any involvement. The main arguments of the NYT, the biography of the alleged "father of cryptocurrency" and the reaction of the crypto community are described in the Izvestia article.

The New York Times version

The NYT claims that the possible creator of bitcoin has been hiding under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto for 17 years, but a chain of evidence hidden deep in cryptocurrency history led to a 55-year-old programmer named Adam Beck. The key arguments of the journalists relate to the Hashcash system, which Beck created in 1997. This Proof-of-Work algorithm later became the basis of bitcoin's mining mechanism, and the Bitcoin white paper published by Satoshi Nakamoto contains a direct link to Back's work.

In addition, Beck actually corresponded with Nakamoto via email, discussing the technical details of the future cryptocurrency. In one of the letters, the creator of bitcoin asked Back to check the citation of an article about Hashcash before publishing it. Linguistic analysis revealed striking similarities in the writing style of Beck and Nakamoto, including characteristic spelling errors and British spelling. The journalists also noticed that Back's online activity disappeared from the forums around the time Nakamoto published the white paper, and returned only after Satoshi ceased his public activities.

Who is Adam Beck?

Adam Beck was born in July 1970 in London. As a child, he studied the Basic programming language on his own, and was interested in reverse engineering video games. In 1996, he received his PhD in computer Science from the University of Exeter, specializing in distributed systems.

In 1997, at the height of the Internet spam crisis, Back developed the Hashcash system, which required the email sender to perform a small amount of calculations, making mass mailing unprofitable. In 2014, he founded Blockstream, a company that develops technologies for bitcoin and popularizes cryptocurrencies in the commercial sector.

Adam Beck's Denials

Immediately after the publication of the NYT investigation, Adam Back issued a categorical denial. He called the journalists' conclusions "confirmation bias," a tendency to seek and interpret information in a way that confirms an already existing theory.

In the social network X (ex. Twitter) he wrote: "I'm not Satoshi, but I focused early on the positive social consequences of cryptography, online privacy, and electronic money." Jokingly, he remarked that he was "kicking himself for not starting mining in 2009," hinting that he did not have the billion-dollar fortune of the real Nakamoto.

More than six times during a meeting in El Salvador, he denied his involvement in the creation of bitcoin, stating that all the coincidences found were an accident. Beck explained his disappearance from the forums by saying that at that time he was "chatting a lot" on the forums, and called the rest of the evidence "a combination of coincidences and similar phrases from people with similar experiences and interests."

Reaction and context

The revelation of Satoshi Nakamoto's identity is considered one of the Internet's most notorious mysteries. The fortune of the bitcoin founder is estimated to be about $70 billion (his wallet, containing more than 1 million coins, has not moved for years). The search for Satoshi has been underway since 2009. Previously, many other people were named in this role, but all these versions have been refuted.

In 2014, Newsweek magazine named Dorian Nakamoto from California as the creator of bitcoin, but this version was not confirmed. In 2015, Australian scientist Craig Wright publicly stated that he was Satoshi, but later a court found him guilty of lying. In 2024, an HBO documentary pointed to Canadian expert Peter Todd, who also denied his involvement.

At the moment, there is no direct evidence that Adam Beck is Satoshi Nakamoto. The NYT investigation is based on circumstantial evidence and logical conclusions. Beck himself categorically denies any involvement. The crypto community, as in previous cases, is divided: some consider the new version convincing, while others consider it another attempt to solve a mystery that may remain unsolved forever.

All important news is on the Izvestia channel in the MAX messenger.