[update 21 May 2019 – the copyright was registered as a necessary condition of defending a claim in court and does not infer that the copyright office has taken a position on whether Wright is Satoshi Nakamoto and has no powers to investigate the merit of the claim. In English law copyright resides with the creator and exists from the moment a work is created. -GM]

Dr Craig S Wright has been granted the US copyright by the US Copyright Office for the bitcoin whitepaper and the bitcoin source code in a huge boost to his claim to be Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous inventor of the digital currency.

The copyright is effective 11 April and the two registrations are as follows:

U.S. copyright registration no. TXu 2-136-996, effective date April 11, 2019, for the paper entitled Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System, with year of completion 2008. The registration recognizes the author as Craig Steven Wright, using the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto.

U.S. copyright registration no. TX-8-708-058, effective date April 13, 2019, for computer program entitled Bitcoin, with year of completion 2009 and date of first publication January 3, 2009. The registration recognizes the author as Craig Steven Wright, using the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto. Wright wrote most of version 0.1 of the Bitcoin client software, and the registration covers the portions he authored.

The Bitcoin White Paper was published in 2018 with bitcoin going live in January 2009.

Lawsuit implications

There may well be a number of individuals who have up until now doubted the authenticity of Wright’s claims who will now have to reconsider that position.

There are yet others who have been caught in the eye of a legal storm after Wright threatened to sue a number of individuals.

Podcaster Peter McCormack is being sued for libel in the UK High Court after McCormack accused Wright of fraud.

Wright is seeking £100,000 in damages plus costs.

The backlash against Wright swelled online when he threatened other individuals and entities with legal action.

Wright is the founder of nChain, the London-based firm that is the developer of Bitcoin SV, a fork from Bitcoin Cash.

SV stands for Satoshi’s Vision, as the project claims it is the true inheritor of the original bitcoin vision of digital cash.

According to CoinGeek, a news site owned by billionaire Calvin Ayre who is a supporter of BSV and Wright’s claims, Wright intends to assign the copyright to the Bitcoin Association a some point in the future.

The CoinGeek report says that the US Copyright Office received “confirmation from Wright that he is Satishi Nakamoto”.

The nature of that confirmation is not known at this time.

Will Binance relist BSV now?

Binance founder and chief executive tweeted that “Craig Wright is not Satoshi” and followed through on a threat to delist BSV.

Craig Wright is not Satoshi. Anymore of this sh!t, we delist! https://t.co/hrnt3fDACq — CZ Binance (@cz_binance) April 12, 2019

BSV has also been delisted from Kraken and Shapeshift because of legal action and threats made by Wright.

The person or persons behind the @hodlonaut Twitter account was Wright’s first target, with lawsuit papers filed on 29 March.

Many in the crypto community rallied to hodlonaut’s defence.

What happen’s to the 1.1 million in the Kleiman Florida case?

The copyright victory is bound to have a bearing on the court case going on in Florida in which Wright stands accused by the estate of David Kleiman of being deprived of access to 1.1 million bitcoins as a result of deliberate actions by Wright’s.

In addition to the 1.1 million bitcoin the Kleiman estate is also seeking compensation for infringement of intellectual property rights.

Kleiman a computer forensics expert who was in at the ground floor, or pretty near it, of bitcoin’s invention, died on 26 April 2013.

BSV initially more than doubled in value on the news