- pseudonymous creator of Bitcoin, published the whitepaper in 2008 and launched the network in 2009
- invented proof-of-work consensus for trustless distributed agreement among anonymous participants
- demonstrated digital scarcity: a fixed 21 million coin supply enforced by code, creating scarcity without physical constraint
- solved the double-spend problem without a central authority, enabling peer-to-peer electronic cash
- disappeared from public communication in 2011, leaving Bitcoin as a self-sustaining autonomous system
- the genesis block contains the message “Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks,” embedding a critique of monetary policy into the chain’s origin
- identity remains unknown, reinforcing the principle that protocols matter more than persons