

Satoshi Nakamoto moves his 6.5 yr old bitcoins - synsynack
https://blockchain.info/address/12c6DSiU4Rq3P4ZxziKxzrL5LmMBrzjrJX

======
sprice
Looks like a problem with Blockchain.info

[https://btc.blockr.io/address/info/12c6DSiU4Rq3P4ZxziKxzrL5L...](https://btc.blockr.io/address/info/12c6DSiU4Rq3P4ZxziKxzrL5LmMBrzjrJX)

edit:// Reddit has more info:
[http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/3frht4/satoshi_naka...](http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/3frht4/satoshi_nakamoto_moved_today_for_the_first_time/)

~~~
sprice
And the reddit thread has already been removed.

Can we get this HN thread hidden? Or at least the title updated?

~~~
joshstrange
Reddit post still shows for me...

~~~
sprice
The link is still active, but notice the "[removed]", and that it does not
appear on /r/bitcoin.

~~~
Natanael_L
Full circle

[http://www.reddit.com/r/bitcoin/comments/3frowt/_/](http://www.reddit.com/r/bitcoin/comments/3frowt/_/)

------
jackgavigan
Looks like a false alarm. Other blockchain explorer sites/tools don't show
this transaction:

Biteasy:
[https://www.biteasy.com/blockchain/addresses/12c6DSiU4Rq3P4Z...](https://www.biteasy.com/blockchain/addresses/12c6DSiU4Rq3P4ZxziKxzrL5LmMBrzjrJX)

Blockr:
[https://btc.blockr.io/address/info/12c6DSiU4Rq3P4ZxziKxzrL5L...](https://btc.blockr.io/address/info/12c6DSiU4Rq3P4ZxziKxzrL5LmMBrzjrJX)

Blocktrail:
[https://www.blocktrail.com/BTC/address/12c6DSiU4Rq3P4ZxziKxz...](https://www.blocktrail.com/BTC/address/12c6DSiU4Rq3P4ZxziKxzrL5LmMBrzjrJX)

WalletExplorer:
[https://www.walletexplorer.com/wallet/1cd472673f5a7d4f?from_...](https://www.walletexplorer.com/wallet/1cd472673f5a7d4f?from_address=12c6DSiU4Rq3P4ZxziKxzrL5LmMBrzjrJX)

------
pmlamotte
For those not aware, the original 50 coins sent to this address were generated
from the genesis block, the first block on the blockchain. However, the
transaction is still unconfirmed, so until it is this could be nothing. Market
has been scared downwards though.

~~~
lisper
I don't understand. Either this transaction has a valid signature or it
doesn't. If it does, then AFACIT the only possible way that it could not be
confirmed sooner or later is if it's a double-spend. What am I missing?

~~~
kragen
Maybe blockchain.info generates its web pages from a database, and someone
inserted a record into the database that doesn't correspond to a transaction
with a valid signature? Although if that's the case you would maybe expect
them to not mark it as "unconfirmed".

~~~
lisper
But surely someone would have just checked the signatures on these
transactions by now? (I would do it myself but I'm not familiar enough with
the bitcoin transaction format.)

~~~
murbul
They're definitely invalid transactions. The public keys and signatures do not
match the address they're trying to spend from. Only blockchain.info failed to
detect this minor detail.

~~~
Natanael_L
"minor"

As in "this plane has no wings" \- "that's minor"

------
ChrisClark
It only appears to be recorded on blockchain.info. None of the other
blockchain explorers seem to see it.

I'd hold off on the news until it's been confirmed.

Edit: Others have checked and can't find any of these transactions in the
blockchain. Either a blockchain.info bug or hack at this point. Nothing has
moved.

~~~
0x0
Would it be possible, just by looking at the blockchain.info website, to prove
that whatever is going on is signed by someone with the private keys to these
coins? If the transaction signatures validates, does it matter whether the
they are accepted by the network - it would still prove "he's alive"?

~~~
ikeboy
It would; however in this case, the signatures do not validate, they're from a
different address.

------
artursapek
And the price tanks immediately:
[https://cryptowat.ch/bitfinex/btcusd/3min](https://cryptowat.ch/bitfinex/btcusd/3min)

~~~
MSM
"Tanking"?

That didn't even cause the lowest trading price _of the past 24 hours_.

~~~
artursapek
For a 5 minute window, I'd consider that tanking. It looks like there is an
issue with bc.info, so it looks like traders are holding off making more
decisions on this news.

------
boxy310
At an exchange rate of $284.45 USD/BTC, this comes out to a transaction of a
little more than $14,000. However, as creator of the Bitcoin protocol and an
early adopter, and that this is one of his oldest wallets, he may be moving
unknown quantities of Bitcoin. This could cause a disruption on the open BTC
markets if he exchanges a large quantity -- but for what reason? No one knows,
since Mr. or Ms. Nakamoto is anonymous.

------
toyg
That's about $15k at today's rate, according to Google. Not much, really.

~~~
Simulacra
That would pay off my student loans nicely. $15k is still much to some :)

~~~
toyg
yeah but he's reportedly worth millions among various wallets. If he spends
them all in one go, the market will take a big hit.

If it's just 15k, it's not a biggie, apart from the news that he's alive (or
at least, that somebody has control of some of his wallets).

------
grubles
From the discussion in #bitcoin on freenode, this is just an elaborate
trolling.

------
boomzilla
Bitcoin newbie here. How do we know that's him?

~~~
justizin
We know that the very first bitcoins in the blockchain are "his", and IIRC
some other coins have been tracked as "his" based on being in the same wallet
or wallets. There are a number of articles on this over the past years.

I say, "his", since we don't know who the creator is, could be a group of
people, might not be a man.

~~~
sneak
> We know that the very first bitcoins in the blockchain are "his",

Technically, we do _not_ know that, we can only assume it.

There is no evidence that the person or persons known as Satoshi have ever
mined coins on the mainnet.

------
oxalo
What's the possibility someone brute forced his private key?

~~~
valarauca1
Highly unlikely.

Bitcoin private keys are 256bit ECDSA keys. The largest key (publically
broken) of this type is ~114bit PS3 hardware key which took 17 months on ~2600
systems.

Reference:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliptic_curve_cryptography#Ke...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliptic_curve_cryptography#Key_sizes)

------
chasing
Is this lack of anonymity a _feature_ of Bitcoin?

~~~
26cf805ae26f
It's a consequence of the fact that the general ledger (aka the blockchain) is
public information. It has to be, otherwise the system would not work; what I
mean is that you cannot design a crypto currency whose ledger is not public
information.

~~~
kragen
It depends on what you mean by "cryptocurrency". None of the Chaum-based
Digital Cash system designs of the 80s and 90s featured a public ledger, but
they weren't decentralized. The public ledger was an innovation of Bitcoin (as
far as I know, even Szabo's property title system didn't propose to make the
ledger actually public), and many people at the time felt that it was a bad
idea, since it gave up anonymity.

It seems plausible that fully homomorphic encryption will eventually enable a
practical and fully anonymous cryptocurrency, but nobody has figured out how
yet. Also, even without FHE, maybe someone will figure out how to make a
Bitcoin-style public-ledger system that somehow uses Chaumian blinded keys
instead of ditching anonymity entirely.

~~~
26cf805ae26f
Um... I stand corrected. Thanks !

------
SlalomStallone
What would the value be in USD?

~~~
neilh23
According to Google - $14,281.50

~~~
artursapek
The point isn't that those 50 Bitcoins are worth $14k, it's that he owns up to
a million of them, and nobody is sure who he is or whether he still had
control of those coins. This seems to prove that he does, unless
blockchain.info is wrong.

~~~
sneak
> it's that he owns up to a million of them

We have no evidence that that is true, however it is widely speculated and
believed to be so.

~~~
nullc
The speculation for that particular number is trivially falsified: It's based
on assumption that all unmoved coins in the first year were mined by the
system's creator (no justification is provided for this assumption).

And it is false, many other people mined during that time and lost keys
(myself included).

------
rainboiboi
Someone kindly explain what's going on please?!

~~~
c-slice
The anonymous inventor of bitcoin had a 50 bitcoin put into the first address
in the blockchain. It's never been moved (because you can see when bitcoins
get moved) but today he moved 50 bitcoin out of the account. We're not totally
sure if it's him though, it could have been a bug or a malicious transaction.

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sktrdie
I'd suggest you delete this post. It's a false alarm.

------
jo6gwb
This is really exciting!

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bra-ket
Who is Satoshi Nakamoto?

~~~
medecau
What is Google?

~~~
yarrel
What is Atlas Shrugged?

(I know, I just wish I didn't)

