A new documentary called “Finding Satoshi” argues that Hal Finney and Len Sassaman were the co-creators of Bitcoin, presenting what filmmakers describe as one of the most compelling cases to date for the identity of Satoshi Nakamoto.
The film follows a four-year investigation led by New York Times bestselling author William D. Cohan and private investigator Tyler Maroney of Quest Research and Investigations, drawing on experts across cryptography, programming, and linguistics.
The candidates
QRI outlined six credible suspects: Adam Back, Nick Szabo, Hal Finney, Len Sassaman, Paul Le Roux, and Wei Dai.
Data scientist Alyssa Blackburn analyzed Satoshi Nakamoto’s early mining and communications activity, finding they were predominantly active between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. PST — a pattern she said matched only Finney and Sassaman among the candidates.
She argued it was “inconceivable” that Back, Szabo, or Dai could be Satoshi based on that analysis, a conclusion that cuts against a recent New York Times investigation suggesting Back as the leading candidate.
The Finney case
PGP Corp. co-founder Will Price, who worked with Finney for 15 years, noted a two-month gap before Bitcoin’s genesis block in January 2009 during which Finney made no commits to his PGP work.
Price said:
“So he’s working on C++ on Windows, which is what Bitcoin is written for and in. What was going on in those two months that the last two months before the release of the Bitcoin source code, Hal made no commits to the source code at work? What was he working on? I think it was Bitcoin.”
Finney passed away from ALS in August 2014. His widow Fran Finney participated in the documentary and said:
“Yes, I think he did help build it. The whitepaper itself, I didn’t think he wrote. But he could have helped. Making edits for it. So what you present in the film makes sense to me.”
Sassaman’s role
Sassaman, who died by suicide in July 2011 — roughly six months after Satoshi’s last public post — lived in Europe at the time Bitcoin was active and frequently used British spellings in his writing, just as Nakamoto did.
His PhD advisor was David Chaum, widely recognized as the “godfather” of cryptocurrency.
Bram Cohen, creator of BitTorrent and close friend of both men, said their interests and habits matched Satoshi’s profile precisely:
“What they liked doing exactly matched what we know about Satoshi Nakamoto, because Satoshi, first and foremost, was a cypherpunk.”
Cohen also explained Sassaman’s public criticism of Bitcoin, noting that publicly disagreeing with a hidden identity was a deliberate tactic to avoid detection.
Industry reaction
Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, whose company supported the film, said it was “the most thoughtful take on this subject I’ve seen out there” and added:
“I suspect you got to the right answer.”
Security researcher Jameson Lopp, who had previously written an article titled “Hal Finney Was Not Satoshi Nakamoto,” called the documentary “easily the most expertly produced Bitcoin documentary” he had seen and described it as “a plausible take that may finally put an end to chasing ghosts.”
The filmmakers noted that there is no evidence Fran Finney or Meredith Patterson — Sassaman’s widow — have any access to Satoshi Nakamoto’s private keys.
“Finding Satoshi” was released globally on April 22 via FindingSatoshi.com.
