Len Sassaman, a cypherpunk who tragically committed suicide in 2011, is the subject identified by Polymarket as the most probable Satoshi Nakamoto to be exposed in an HBO documentary this Tuesday. A firm believer in privacy and an IT Cryptographic enthusiast Sassaman was involved in the projects of Computer Security and Industrial Cryptography. He also launched an annual conference dedicated to software hacking.
Evan Leung Hatch used to suggest that Sassaman might have been actually the mastermind behind Bitcoin. Lucas ties Sassaman’s suicide to the posting of Nakamoto’s final message two months prior to that incident. The above message read, “I must accept other things in life and may not be here in the future”.
Leung speaks of features that Nakamoto left unrealized or unimplemented, together with the fact that he never touched the Bitcoins he owned worth over $60 billion for a dime before vanishing. He also notes that Sassaman contributed to PGP encryption and remailers which formed part of the basics for developing Bitcoin.
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Len Sassaman or Hal Finney? The Debate Over Bitcoin’s True Creator Heats Up
A prediction market platform called PolyMarket conducted a poll to find out who Satoshi Nakamoto is. The chance that bettors of the platform will agree with the general opinion that HBO’s upcoming documentary will expose Len Sassaman, a late cryptographer and privacy advocate, as the BTC’s real creator, is 42%. It will also bring to the surface new discussions over the main topic of Bitcoin: The Movie – who exactly Satoshi Nakamoto is and where did he or she come from.
Thus, Evan Leung Hatch continues a well-accepted explanation of the identity of Sassaman with Nakamoto. He said that maybe Sassaman committed suicide in 2011 by consuming cyanide since Nakamoto mentioned in his last message two months before his disappearance that “I’ve moved on to other things and probably won’t be around in the future.”
How Nakamoto’s Legacy Links to Sassaman’s Contributions
Leung suggests that Nakamoto left “unfinished features,” and when he “vanished,” accessed his Bitcoin holdings valued today at more than $60 billion. Rather, he emphasizes Sassaman’s work in advancing encryption technologies like PGP and remailers, which he considers crucial to Bitcoin’s origin.
On the other side of the debate, many reckon that one of the greatest legend software developers, Hal Finney, might be the real Nakamoto. Finney, who died in 2014, became a matter of discussion in the Bitcoin community for being involved early on and for his idea of “20 million coins giving each coin a value of about $10 million” in an experiment thought up before the whitepaper of Bitcoin.
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Polymarket Pool Volume Surpasses $3 Million
As of October 6, the Polymarket pool has reached a volume of over $3,143,334. It’s all getting rather exciting ahead of next week’s premiere of the documentary Money Electric: The Bitcoin Mystery. Directed by Cullen Hoback, this potentially outing where the filmmaker might discuss Satoshi Nakamoto’s identity is generating buzz.
Neither HBO nor the film’s director had denied the rumors, but those teasers and reports in recent weeks seem to point to something more real. When the betting website Polymarket pegged Len Sassaman as the likely Satoshi Nakamoto candidate early last year, 42 percent of viewers were still confident the documentary would uphold him.
