

Did a reporter just solve the bitcoin mystery? - andrewpi
https://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2011/10/03/141011155/did-a-reporter-just-solve-the-bitcoin-mystery

======
SkyMarshal
_"The writer also notes that Satoshi typically uses British (rather than
American) spellings.

So he narrows the field to people from the UK at Crypto2011."_

Not Singapore, NZ, Australia, Hong Kong, India or any number of prior British
colonies that use British English and spellings instead of American? (How
about China? Not sure what English version they use, but wouldn't be surprised
it's Brit).

Unles there was no one from any of those countries at Crypto2011, then it
looks like he excluded up to 2/3rds of the solution space.

Also, I wouldn't be surprised at a skilled cryptologist who wanted to stay
incognito faking his spellings to throw people off. For example, I'm not a
cryptologist, am American, am not trying to be incognito, and enjoy using
British slang and spellings occasionally anyway. And this guy Clear sounds
like he's enjoying taking the piss out of the reporter.

~~~
tokenadult
_(How about China? Not sure what English version they use, but wouldn't be
surprised it's Brit)._

I'm well acquainted with many native speakers of Chinese who have learned
English as a second language (and am married to one). There was a time when
the British standard was consciously preferred by educational authorities for
English instruction in both China and Taiwan. But that time is past. American
English spellings are dominant in China and in a larger part of the "expanding
circle" of international use of English.

<http://www.pyrtvu.cn/xush/home.files/text/8.htm>

<http://www.inst.at/trans/15Nr/06_1/price15.htm>

[http://dooku.miun.se/engelska/englishB/languageprof/Student%...](http://dooku.miun.se/engelska/englishB/languageprof/Student%20work/VT06/First%20final%20drafts/Helena%20Ling.htm)

[http://c-faculty.chuo-u.ac.jp/~mikenix1/co/we/Future_of_Engl...](http://c-faculty.chuo-u.ac.jp/~mikenix1/co/we/Future_of_English.pdf)

<http://www.palgrave.com/pdfs/1403918309.pdf>

~~~
vessenes
Satoshi's English was better than would be indicated by most Chinese students.

~~~
masklinn
The guy seems to be an excellent developer with a very strong knowledge of
crypto. He would not be "most Chinese students" (indeed he would not be "most
students" at all), especially in writing.

------
feral
This appears to be a denial by the person in question:
<http://www.scss.tcd.ie/~clearm/bitcoin.html>

I did the same undergrad as the guy. I have to say, I'd be really impressed if
he put together Bitcoin just as he was finishing college. I would have guessed
it was designed by someone, or group, with many years experience developing
crypto infrastructure. But who knows.

The bit at the end of the article, about the wallets being encrypted, seems
completely spurious to me, and no evidence that the reporter found the right
guy (which the reporter seems to intend it to be).

~~~
jjm
Well it is very possible these gentlemen socialize in the same circles.
Interesting read indeed.

------
cincinnatus
Never title something with a question that can be answered "No."

~~~
joshu
Any article that has a question as a title is always answered "no".

~~~
shaggyfrog
Not sure why you are getting downvoted. I think that it's one of those
"Internet Laws" but I can't find a reference as my Google-fu is weak.

~~~
joshu
I think it's an HN thing. At least, I heard it here.

I get downvoted a lot.

~~~
shaggyfrog
I think I heard it here, too. It's funny how often the rule works, mainly with
sensationalist news stories. "Is this the iPod killer?" No.

------
grot
You should read the original article:

[http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/10/10/111010fa_fact_...](http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/10/10/111010fa_fact_davis)
(subscription required, unfortunately =/. use your uni account or something)

The tone there is much more neutral, because Michael Clear in fact qualifies
his statement.

quote from the new yorker article -----------------------

Clear responded that his work for Allied Irish Banks was brief and of "no
importance". He admitted that he was a good programmer, understood
cryptography, and appreciated the bitcoin design. But, he said, economics had
never been a particular interest of his. "I am not Satoshi," Clear said. "But
even if I was I wouldn't tell you."

The point, Cler continued, is that Nakamoto's identity shouldn't matter. The
system was built so we don't have to trust an individual, a company, or a
government. Anybody can review the code, and the network isn't controlled by
any one entity. That's what inspires confidence in the system. Bitcoin, in
other words, survives because of what you can see and what you can't. Users
are hidden, but transactions are exposed. The code is visible to all, but its
origins are mysterious. The currency is both real and elusive -- just like its
founder.

"You can't kill it," Clear said, with a touch of bravado. "Bitcoin would
survive a nuclear attack."

------
pavel_lishin
So, anyone written any software that compares two pieces of code and gives the
odds of them both being written by the same person?

~~~
baddox
One of my CS professors claimed he had a script to analyze all of his
students' programming assignments to find possible instances of cheating. I
have no idea how extensive his algorithm was: it could have been anything from
a simple whitespace and variable name normalization to an analysis of the
abstract syntax tree. Or he may have just been bluffing.

~~~
nhaehnle
Here's a very simple trick that works for programming languages with a C-style
syntax: strip out everything except parentheses, braces, and semicolons and
compare. I know that it was used successfully in an algorithms course
(shortest paths, flows, that kind of stuff) which had stand-alone
implementations of the algorithms as assignments.

Edit: Of course there was a manual inspection step involved as well, this
matching process was only used to flag suspicious instances.

~~~
eru
And I wouldn't punish cheating in those courses directly: Just add the
requirement that people need to be able to explain their solutions however
they arrived at them. Being able to explain other people's code is a useful
skill, too.

~~~
fluidcruft
It may be a useful skill, but it's also not what's being taught in an
algorithms course.

------
sipefree
I've met Michael Clear a few times, being in the same University as him and
generally hanging around with the same crowd of people.

As much as I would love to believe this conspiracy, and would suddenly make my
pub meetings with his research group way more interesting, I don't think it's
him. But I will keep this article in mind so I can bring it up at every
opportunity.

------
jonaldomo
The shroud of secrecy hardens my conspiracy theory that bitcoin was created by
the FBI to track illegal payments.

~~~
radu_floricica
Not created by them, but when people start using a perfectly traceable
currency to make illegal purchases, the FBI must rub their hands in glee...

~~~
flabbergasted
Until they try to trace it to an actual person...

~~~
radu_floricica
If people assume bitcoin itself is untraceable, they will most likely neglect
to try to hide the entry/exit points. And from what I read around, many do
make this assumption.

------
DiabloD3
NPR should stick to reporting real news.

------
ook
There's a pretty good interview with Michael Clear in todays Irish Times:

[http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/weekend/2011/1008/122430...](http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/weekend/2011/1008/1224305442727.html)

------
Anti-Ratfish
I hope that British spellings weren't the basis of the UK search. A fair
portion of the English speaking world use British spellings. Not that I'm
claiming bitcoin for New Zealand.

------
RyanKearney
Good job, link to an https article when over half the content on the page is
delivered via HTTP.

------
briandear
Finally! Another bitcoin story makes it to the front page of HN again! It's
been a long time. I was beginning to think the HN community has moved on to
more important things. When will this Bitcoin nonsense fade away? I think the
dollar/yuan situation is far more relevant than some fairy coins nobody uses
outside of the World of Warcraft crowd.

------
Mizza
The line

> "I'm not Satoshi"

reminded me of this: <http://pbfcomics.com/archive_b/PBF045-Wise_Shitashi.jpg>

Wonder if Satoshi likes PBF..

