- Failed Satoshi wannabe Craig Wright has filed a lawsuit against Bitcoin developers and Square, alleging wrongful passing off and misrepresentation of Bitcoin
- Wright claims that the Bitcoin protocol has been altered with modifications such as SegWit and Taproot, deviating from Satoshi Nakamoto’s original Bitcoin white paper
- Wright seeks damages totaling $1.2 trillion, asserting that these changes have caused significant market and reputational losses to Bitcoin Satoshi Vision (BSV).
Failed Satoshi Nakamoto impersonator Craig Wright has returned to bother the UK court system again by filing a scarcely believable $1.2 trillion claim against Bitcoin developers and crypto company Square. Wright, who in March was accused of defrauding the court on his way to losing his Satoshi claim against the Cryptocurrency Open Patent Alliance (COPA), claims that the developers, which he collectively calls BTC Core, misrepresented BTC as the original Bitcoin by altering its protocol with SegWit and Taproot updates. Wright, representing himself, argues that the true version of Bitcoin, represented by Bitcoin Satoshi Vision (BSV), adheres strictly to Satoshi’s original white paper and seeks damages of £911 billion ($1.2 trillion) for the financial harm and reputational loss caused by this alleged misrepresentation, which has confused the market and devalued BSV.
Developers “Passing Off” Bitcoin as BTC
Wright’s claim focuses on what Wright calls the “wrongful passing off” of BTC as the original Bitcoin, alleging that key protocol changes introduced over the years have diverged from the vision outlined in the 2008 Bitcoin white paper.
Specifically, Wright points to updates like Segregated Witness (SegWit) and Taproot, which he says alter the foundational principles of Bitcoin. Wright sued exchanges such as Coinbase and Kraken in 2021 over the same issue, but these were automatically stopped when Wright lost to COPA earlier this year.
Wright was prevented from venting about the modifications made to Bitcoin in his COPA case, and it seems he is still determined to have his day in court over the matter, alleging that the ‘passing off’ has caused confusion in the cryptocurrency market and led to “significant reputational damage and loss of market value to BSV.”
A Trillion Dollars in Damages
Wright is seeking over a trillion dollars in damages, which he explained in the filing:
Estimated value of claim: £911,050,000,000. This is based on the difference in market valuation between Bitcoin (BSV) at £50 per unit and BTC at £48,000 per unit, reflecting the financial impact of misrepresentation and resulting market loss.
In Wright’s view, the defendants have not only misled consumers and investors but have also undermined the original Bitcoin project by promoting BTC as the legitimate successor to the original vision.
Champagne Case Cited
Wright appears to have given advance notice of this lawsuit in a 9 October X post which referenced a case of Bollinger v Costa Brava:
Under English law, I can pursue a passing-off claim against BTC developers through what is known as a “champagne passing-off” action. This type of passing-off is named after cases like Bollinger v. Costa Brava, where the use of the term “champagne” for sparkling wine was…
— S Tominaga (@CsTominaga) October 9, 2024
While Wright seems to be correct on the surface, there are other considerations to bear in mind. The first is that the Bollinger case involved an established, legally protected designation (Champagne), while Bitcoin’s protocol does not have similar geographical or regulatory protections. Wright’s argument hinges on the idea that developers’ alterations have violated the original vision of Bitcoin, but this is more subjective compared to the clear geographic protection in Bollinger.
Wright also claims that BTC buyers have been misled into buying what they thought were bitcoins when, in fact, they weren’t due to the changes. Similarly, in Wright’s view, in Bollinger, consumers were misled into thinking they were buying Champagne, a product associated with a specific region and quality. However, proving consumer confusion in the cryptocurrency market, where protocol changes and forks are common, may be more difficult than in the traditional product market of Bollinger.
Wright’s damages are also the financial equivalent of throwing a dart at a dartboard, with the valuations of BTC and BSV arbitrarily used with little factual basis.
Injunction May Scupper Attempts
Wright also suffers from the problem that, in May, he was hit with an injunction preventing him from litigating based on the supposition that he was Satoshi Nakamoto or that he created the Bitcoin protocol. However, Wright seems to have done just this, with one reader pointing out five transgressions:
I counted 5 injunctions infringed upon. Any others? pic.twitter.com/8pMapgvN7p
— Jendalyn (@Jendalynwins) October 13, 2024
Wright tried to get around this with the sentence, “For the purposes of this litigation, the identity of Satoshi Nakamoto is irrelevant,” before citing in several places that he was behind the protocol.
It is now up to either COPA or the Bitcoin developers Wright lost to earlier in the year to file a complaint with the court that Wright has violated his injunction, which, if successful, would see the case struck out and Wright hit with a contempt of court charge.
