{"id":86052,"date":"2023-10-22T11:11:39","date_gmt":"2023-10-22T08:11:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/?p=86052"},"modified":"2025-09-13T03:05:54","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T00:05:54","slug":"opinion-satoshi-nakamoto-is-not-hal-finney","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/opinion-satoshi-nakamoto-is-not-hal-finney\/","title":{"rendered":"Opinion: Satoshi Nakamoto Is Not Hal Finney"},"content":{"rendered":"

Co-founder and CTO Casa Jameson Lopp \u043f\u0440\u0438\u0432\u0435\u043b<\/a> arguments against the theory that Bitcoin pioneer Hal Finney was the creator of the first cryptocurrency Satoshi Nakamoto<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In his blog he recounted the Santa Barbara, California, USA, race on 18 April 2009. In it \u0443\u0447\u0430\u0441\u0442\u0432\u043e\u0432\u0430\u043b<\/a> Finney. He started at 8:00 local time and finished about 78 minutes later.<\/p>\n

Lopp’s version rests on the claim that Finney could not interact with a computer at that time. To corroborate the Bitcoin pioneer’s participation in the race, he attaches a photo of the latter \u2014 the number on his T-shirt matches the archival data.<\/p>\n

\"hal_finney_santa_barbara_10_miler-1\"
Data: lopp.net<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Lopp cites the correspondence<\/a> between Satoshi and former Bitcoin Core developer Mike Hearn, published by the latter. The Bitcoin creator sent one of the letters on 18 April 2009 at 18:16.<\/p>\n

According to the investigation, Hearn’s IP address at the time belonged to a Swiss Internet provider. He could have been working from a Google office in Zurich. Thus, in California at the time the letter was sent it was 9:16 \u2014 Finney could not have done this, as he had not yet crossed the finish line.<\/p>\n

As additional argument, Lopp cites the publication<\/a> by Hal’s wife about attending the Singularity Summit in San Francisco on 14-15 August 2010. In the post she explains that Finney could barely type due to diagnosed amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. At the same time, Satoshi was actively online.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cUndoubtedly, some will argue that the presented arguments do not conclusively prove that Hal is not Satoshi. Indeed, proving a negation is often impossible. But I believe that the accumulation of facts creates so much doubt that a reasonable person would conclude: most likely, Satoshi is someone else\u201d, \u2014 wrote Lopp.<\/cite><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

According to him, after several months of investigation he said he was prepared to stake his reputation on this assertion.<\/p>\n

In September 2021, in Budapest, Hungary \u0443\u0441\u0442\u0430\u043d\u043e\u0432\u0438\u043b\u0438<\/a> a statue of Satoshi Nakamoto.<\/p>\n

In September 2023, Web3<\/a>-project built on the network of the first cryptocurrency, Trust Machines \u043e\u043f\u0443\u0431\u043b\u0438\u043a\u043e\u0432\u0430\u043b \u0432\u0438\u0434\u0435\u043e<\/a> from 25 years ago, in which Finney explains the essence \u0434\u043e\u043a\u0430\u0437\u0430\u0442\u0435\u043b\u044c\u0441\u0442\u0432 \u0441 \u043d\u0443\u043b\u0435\u0432\u044b\u043c \u0440\u0430\u0437\u0433\u043b\u0430\u0448\u0435\u043d\u0438\u0435\u043c<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Co-founder and CTO of Casa, Jameson Lopp, presented arguments against the theory that Bitcoin pioneer Hal Finney was Satoshi Nakamoto.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":86053,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"select":"1","news_style_id":"1","cryptorium_level":"","_short_excerpt_text":"","creation_source":"","_metatest_mainpost_news_update":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[376,111],"class_list":["post-86052","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-hal-finney","tag-satoshi-nakamoto"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"views":"52","promo_type":"1","layout_type":"1","short_excerpt":"","is_update":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86052"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86052\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":86054,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86052\/revisions\/86054"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/86053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}