Craig Wright has claimed to be Bitcoin’s creator since 2016.
The trial is scheduled to commence at the beginning of 2024.
On July 20, a British court accepted an appeal and allowed Craig Wright the ability to present evidence in court to support his claim that the Bitcoin file format is sufficiently well-defined to be protected by copyright.
Wright, who has claimed to be Bitcoin’s creator since 2016, filed a lawsuit against 13 Bitcoin Core developers and a group of firms including Coinbase for allegedly infringing on his copyright to the Bitcoin white paper, its file format, and the Bitcoin blockchain database.
The judgment overturned a lower court’s February finding. That Wright had failed to provide adequate evidence of fixation (the initial recording of work) in the Bitcoin file format.
Trial to Commence in 2024
Moreover, the Bitcoin Legal Defense Fund (BLDF), which acts as the developers’ legal representation, contends that Wright has failed to provide sufficient evidence that he is the enigmatic figurehead behind the Bitcoin white paper and database.
BLDF stated:
“Wright has claimed to be Satoshi since at least 2016 without providing a shred of evidence to back up this claim.”
The trial is scheduled to commence at the beginning of 2024. Users have the freedom to incorporate Bitcoin’s source code into their own projects, even if those projects are proprietary. Since the Bitcoin code is open-sourced and freely distributed under a license from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
However, Wright has claimed that the Bitcoin Core developers are part of a “Bitcoin Partnership,” a single body with power over the Bitcoin network. The fact that British courts are even considering his claims, as BLDF sees it, is very worrisome.