Hal Finney Was Not Satoshi Nakamoto
The identity probably isn&#x27;t one person but there are people that stand out.<p>Nick Szabo has been potentially mentioned as Satoshi for sometime [1] due to him working on decentralized currencies since 1998 with Bit Gold [2].
Elon Musk mentioned Nick Szabo on Lex Fridman&#x27;s podcast as Szabo was also doing Bit Gold prior and is heavy into crypto and currencies. [3]<p>&gt; &quot;Obviously I don&#x27;t know who created bitcoin ... it seems as though Nick Szabo is probably more than anyone else responsible for the evolution of those ideas,&quot; said Musk, adding, &quot;he claims not to be Nakamoto ... but he seems to be the one more responsible for the ideas behind it than anyone else.&quot;<p>&gt; Szabo is best known as the inventor of one of bitcoin’s predecessors, Bit Gold, and digital smart contracts—which eventually evolved to become a key part of the ethereum blockchain. Szabo has previously denied he&#x27;s Satoshi Nakamoto, telling financial author Dominic Frisby in 2014, &quot;I&#x27;m afraid you got it wrong doxing me as Satoshi, but I&#x27;m used to it.&quot;<p>Szabo&#x27;s full name is Nicholas Szabo [4]. Just seems quite a bit like Satoshi Nakamoto. It feels like there is something there potentially.<p>He uses his initials for his Pseudonyms (N.S)<p>Nakamoto Satoshi = Bitcoin<p>Nicholas Saberhagen = Monero<p>Bit Gold was maybe to test out interest, then when the real one was made it would be more anonymous. If you think about it, bitcoin being anonymous is a feature as it makes it seem less centralized eventhough Satoshi owns a large chunk of it. Today companies or individuals will control a large chunk of other coins&#x2F;platforms and it feels more centralized or even autocratic. At any time those big fish could wreak havoc. Satoshi seems more hands off.
Another potential reason is the money it would generate and the recognition would attract too much attention. The successful decentralized currency like bitcoin might have been foreseen as a threat to the creator after it takes off and gains in value.<p>From the wiki on Nick Szabo, he is more &#x27;reclusive&#x27; and not wanting to be known. On his blog he mentioned his intent on creating a live version of the currency as Bit Gold was more of a prototype&#x2F;demo and was never launched. Even the name Bit Gold and bitcoin are very similar as is the name Nicholas Szabo (N.S.) and Satoshi Nakamoto (S.N.) in a few ways. Satoshi Nakamoto always seems like a purposeful shroud of a name, looking for someone by that name is probably not going to find them:<p>&gt; Nathaniel Popper wrote in The New York Times that &quot;the most convincing evidence pointed to a reclusive American man of Hungarian descent named Nick Szabo.&quot; In 2008, prior to the release of bitcoin, Szabo wrote a comment on his blog about the intent of creating a live version of his hypothetical currency. [1]<p>Hal Finney was the first to receive 10 bitcoins from Satoshi Nakamoto [5][6]. Hal Finney was the next employee after Phil Zimmermann at PGP. So he knew the potential for being pursued by governments for software creations. Hal, who died in 2014 unfortunately, probably knew Satoshi and would have known he was shrouding&#x2F;anonymous for good reasons as seen in the PGP history just before that and around the same time bit gold was being created.<p>The very likely people to be Satoshi Nakamoto are Nick Szabo and Hal Finney due to the early interactions and transactions, and potentially Dorian Satoshi Nakamoto, but that seems unlikely they would use their real name [7]. Maybe it was all three or someone else entirely, these guys are just around the early days and some of the first transactions. Either that or someone or some group saw the need for decentralized currency from their efforts and then front ran them and made it seem more like them to help shroud themselves.<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Nick_Szabo#Satoshi_Nakamoto_speculation" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Nick_Szabo#Satoshi_Nakamoto_sp...</a><p>[2] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Nick_Szabo#Bit_gold" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Nick_Szabo#Bit_gold</a><p>[3] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.forbes.com&#x2F;sites&#x2F;billybambrough&#x2F;2021&#x2F;12&#x2F;28&#x2F;elon-musk-reveals-bitcoin-creator-satoshi-nakamoto-theory-admits-he-doesnt-get-ethereum-and-issues-dogecoin-mars-prediction-amid-crypto-price-crash&#x2F;?sh=629b6a185d0e" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.forbes.com&#x2F;sites&#x2F;billybambrough&#x2F;2021&#x2F;12&#x2F;28&#x2F;elon-...</a><p>[4] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Nick_Szabo" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Nick_Szabo</a><p>[5] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Nick_Szabo#Satoshi_Nakamoto_speculation" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Nick_Szabo#Satoshi_Nakamoto_sp...</a><p>[6] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Hal_Finney_(computer_scientist)#Bitcoin" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Hal_Finney_(computer_scientist...</a><p>[7] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Satoshi_Nakamoto#Possible_identities" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Satoshi_Nakamoto#Possible_iden...</a>