The Australian computer scientist who claimed to be the enigmatic bitcoin inventor “Satoshi Nakamoto” has “extensively and repeatedly” lied about his identity, a British judge said in a scathing ruling.
Judge James Mellor of London’s High Court determined that Craig Wright, who has insisted for years that he authored the 2008 white paper that spawned bitcoin, had also committed forgery “on a grand scale” to convince the world he was Satoshi.
The judge had already determined in March that there was “overwhelming” evidence against Wright’s claim that he was Satoshi.
“Dr. Wright presents himself as an extremely clever person. However, in my judgment, he is not nearly as clever as he thinks he is,” Mellor wrote Monday as he gave the reasons for his conclusions.
“All his lies and forged documents were in support of his biggest lie: his claim to be Satoshi Nakamoto.”
Wright faced trial in connection to a lawsuit filed by the Crypto Open Patent Alliance, which was attempting to halt his bid to sue bitcoin developers for allegedly violating his intellectual property rights.
COPA – whose members include Twitter founder Jack Dorsey’s payments firm Block – described Monday’s ruling as “a watershed moment for the open-source community”.
“Developers can now continue their important work maintaining, iterating on, and improving the bitcoin network without risking their personal livelihoods or fearing costly and time-consuming litigation from Craig Wright,” a COPA spokesperson said in a statement.
Wright was specifically asked about the forgery allegations during the trial and denied wrongdoing.
“If I forged that document, it would be perfect,” Wright said when presented with one alleged forgery.
COPA said it may ask UK prosecutors to bring perjury charges against Wright.
“Dr Wright’s attempts to prove he was/is Satoshi Nakamoto represent a most serious abuse of this Court’s process,” Mellor said in his ruling.
Despite the harsh rebuke, Wright said Monday in a post on X that he intends to challenge the court ruling.
“I fully intend to appeal the decision of the court on the matter of the identity issue,” the post said. “I would like to acknowledge and thank all my supporters for their unwavering encouragement and support.”
The person or persons behind the Satoshi Nakamoto pseudonym are known to possess a stash of up to 1.1 million bitcoins – valued at more than $78 billion at present.
A single bitcoin was worth more than $71,000 as of Tuesday, with prices surging more than 60% since the start of the year.
Bitcoin’s market cap is more than $1.4 trillion, far higher than any other digital currency on the market.
With Post wires
