Wright admits he’s not Satoshi, as the Crypto Open Patent Alliance accused him of forgery in court and asserted that he “invented an entire biographical history.”
Craig Wright asserted on July 16 that he is not the pseudonymous creator of Bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto, in a legal disclaimer posted on the main page of his website.
The disclaimer referenced the most recent ruling from the United Kingdom High Court of Justice and directed website traffic to the summary of the findings presented by the Crypto Open Patent Alliance (COPA), a consortium of developers, exchanges, and projects designed to promote innovation and facilitate an open-source environment in the crypto industry.
Perhaps the most significant components of the disclaimer were the initial and second points, which acknowledged that Wright was not the author of the Bitcoin white paper and that the computer scientist does not possess a copyright to the technology described in the white paper.
Wright v. Crypto Open Patent Alliance
Several Bitcoin developers were sued by Wright in 2023, who claimed that they had violated his copyrights on some of the underlying technology for the distributed ledger system and had claimed rights to the Bitcoin database.
Wright had been asserting that he was the fabled, pseudonymous creator of Bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto, since 2016. The Crypto Open Patent Alliance presented over 50 pieces of evidence in 2024, dismantling Wright’s claims and resulting in a crescendo in the legal battle.
During the trial, COPA sought testimony from forensic experts and on-chain analysts, alleging that Wright had generated a collection of intricate forgeries and metadata that indicated interference.
Ultimately, Judge James Mellor concurred that COPA’s arguments demonstrated that the architect of a highly technical system such as Bitcoin would not commit the casual errors discovered in Wright’s forgeries and distorted metadata, thereby conclusively determining that Wright was not Satoshi.
The United Kingdom’s High Court has recently suspended Wright’s assets to assist podcaster Peter McCormack in recovering $2 million in legal fees expended in defense of a defamation lawsuit that Wright filed in 2019.
Additionally, Wright’s legal complications may still need to be resolved. Judge Mellor recommended that the Crown Prosecution Service investigate Wright for perjury in response to the High Court’s ruling.
