Craig Wright Accuses Bitcoin Core Developers of Misleading the Market

Craig Wright, an Australian computer scientist and businessman who continues to claim he is Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous creator of Bitcoin (BTC)

Bitcoin (BTC) creator Satoshi Nakamoto impersonator Craig Wright has filed a new lawsuit against Bitcoin Core developers, alleging that recent upgrades to the flagship cryptocurrency have altered its original design.

Key Points

Craig Wright, an Australian computer scientist who continues to maintain that he is Satoshi Nakamoto, has filed a lawsuit against Bitcoin Core developers, including Square Up Europe Limited, a subsidiary of Jack Dorsey's Block.

The lawsuit, filed in the Chancery Division of the High Court in London on Monday, alleges that the defendants altered Bitcoin’s original features through the Taproot upgrade and Segregated Witness (SegWit) integration, which according to Wright deviates from the original vision of Bitcoin.

In the filing, the self-acclaimed Satoshi claims that the modifications to the Bitcoin blockchain have caused “confusion within the market,” misleading the public into believing that Bitcoin retains its original attributes.

According to him, the changes undermine the essence of what Satoshi Nakamoto originally designed and implemented. As a result, Wright is seeking the difference in market value between Bitcoin (BTC) and Bitcoin Satoshi’s Vision (BSV), which he claims is the true continuation of the original Bitcoin protocol.

At the time of the filing on October 10, BTC was trading at $62,000 (£48,000), while BSV stood at $65 (£50), leading Wright to pursue a claim of $1.18 billion (£911 million) in damages.

The Australian businessman is known for his persistent efforts to prove his identity as the creator of Bitcoin and attempts to gain control over the cryptocurrency’s original codebase.

In a previous lawsuit against Bitcoin.Org's “Cøbra,” he claimed copyright infringement of the Bitcoin whitepaper Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System, which he says he authored. However, Lord Justice Arnold dismissed the case, ruling that Wright's evidence was insufficient to establish his claim.

Despite being banned by the court from filing more litigation relating to Satoshi Nakamoto's identity, Wright remains undeterred, arguing in this latest lawsuit that Bitcoin Satoshi’s Vision (BSV) is the true version of the cryptocurrency originally designed by Satoshi.

In another failed attempt to prove his claim as Satoshi Nakamoto, Wright was involved in a defamation case with prominent Bitcoin advocate Magnus Granath, who is also known by the online alias “Hodlonaut.”

After Granath called Wright a “scammer” in a series of tweets in 2019, Wright sued him, but a Norwegian court ruled that Granath's comments were not defamatory and were fair in the context of Wright's public statements.

During the proceedings, the court noted that the term “scammer” must be understood to mean “swindler” or “cheat maker,” and in this case, it applied to Wright, who a large part of the Bitcoin community believes is trying to “scam” people by presenting a false narrative.

The court's ruling further stated that Granath's use of the words “fraud” and “fake” in reference to Wright were also protected by freedom of expression.

"Fraud' or 'fraudulently' in this context refers to 'someone who is not what they claim to be.' Similarly, 'fake' refers to something 'illegitimate' or 'false,' and 'scammer' must be understood to mean 'swindler' or 'cheat maker."

In the case of Bitcoin and the person claiming to be Satoshi, the court noted that a large part of the Bitcoin community and many others believe that Wright is trying to scam people by presenting a false narrative.

"When Hodlonaut calls Craig Wright a scammer in this context, he claims that Craig Wright is trying to scam people by presenting a false narrative, which a large part of the Bitcoin community, and many others, believe.”

As part of the proceedings, Wright was asked to prove his identity as Satoshi by signing a message using the private key associated with Bitcoin’s genesis block, which he failed to do and was unable to provide an explanation for.

Later on, Wright claimed that he had destroyed the hard drive containing the secret phrase to the wallet that contained the genesis private key in 2016 after being locked out for two years.