RAAF Wing Commander Donald Lynam: Craig Wright Discussed Using the "Satoshi Nakamoto" Pseudonym with Me

The Kleiman v Wright trial is already on its 12th day in court. The plaintiff rested its case on the 10th day, and yet, there has been no seriously compelling evidence that proves their allegation of Craig Wright cheating David Kleiman out of half the credit for being the Satoshi Nakamoto pseudonym who wrote the Bitcoin white paper and half of the 1.1 million Satoshi coins. 

Brief Background

Kleiman v Wright is a civil case wherein Ira Kleiman, representing his late brother David Kleiman’s estate and W&K Info Defense Research, LLC, is suing computer scientist Craig Wright for at least $11.5 billion or up to 50% of 1.1 million Bitcoin valued currently at about US$63 billion. 

Ira Kleiman is asserting that David Kleiman and Wright were in a partnership behind the Satoshi Nakamoto pseudonym who authored the Bitcoin white paper and that the two men were in a business partnership when they mined the 1.1 million coins through W&K Info Defense Research, LLC.

The defense is refuting these allegations by establishing that Wright alone wrote the Bitcoin white paper—although David Kleiman may have edited it—and the concept for Bitcoin was Wright’s alone. 

Furthermore, even if Wright and David Kleiman were partners in several projects and the two were best friends, they did not mine Bitcoin together and there is no evidence of an operating agreement or any such document stating that the two were business partners in mining the Satoshi coins. 

W&K Info Defense Research, LLC was set up properly in the United States, with an official registration in the State of Florida, in 2011. Aside from the entity not mining Bitcoin at all, the Satoshi coins were mined early on after the creation of Bitcoin in 2009—way before W&K Info Defense Research, LLC was established.

Donald Lynam’s Crucial Testimony

As the defense starts to call in their witnesses and present video depositions in court, it is clear that the plaintiff’s allegations are starting to come undone. And crucial to the timeline of the writing of the Bitcoin white paper is Donald Lynam’s testimony.

Lynam is Wright’s maternal uncle; although being a family member may discredit Lynam as someone who has been asked to provide his support to his nephew in court as pointed out by the plaintiff’s counsel in the cross-examination, his background and entire demeanor belie this.

Lynam served as a Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) Wing Commander. For his exemplary service to the Logistics Branch Headquarters Support Command in the RAAF, he earned an appointment to the Order of Australia in 1985, which confers “the highest recognition for outstanding achievement and service.”

Upon returning to his home country after his tour of exchange in the United States, Lynam headed a management systems group, which was credited for creating several systems integral to the RAAF. Being a military man, whose entire demeanor exudes wit, discipline and sincerity, Lynam is someone people cannot help but listen to when speaking. 

“If I didn’t think that absolutely honest answers would be of assistance to Craig, I probably would have said that I don’t want to depose… I agreed to do it because I have so much faith in Craig and my knowledge of what happened through that time that I have high confidence that Craig has behaved correctly and my understanding of it is correct, and I can answer all the questions with absolute honesty,” Lynam said in his deposition.

Having an absentee father, it isn’t surprising Craig Wright considers Lynam to be his role model, often consulting with him about his work and white papers he was writing. The Bitcoin white paper was no exception as Lynam testifies to having received a rough draft of the said white paper in mid-2008, a few months before it was released in October 31, 2008.

“I think the determination of the actual name was still floating at the point I got the white paper, but it was clearly to be a digital monetary system,” Lynam stated.

“I don’t think the paper was headed ‘Bitcoin’, but I have no doubt in my mind that that was the precursor, because it had the same content as the paper that came out—or very similar content,” Lynam added.

Ronald Lynam’s Influence on the Satoshi Nakamoto Pseudonym

According to Donald Lynam, his father and Wright’s grandfather Ronald Lynam indirectly influenced Wright’s decision to use the now famous Satoshi Nakamoto pseudonym. Ronald Lynam was a  cryptographic expert who served in the Australian Army during World War II.

Ronald Lynam, who was formerly a radio and electrical engineer before enlisting, reached the rank of major and joined an Allied intelligence group, and later became a member of the renowned Bletchley Park codebreakers, a highly confidential project that made use of the world’s first computer to decode German army and air force messages during the war. 

Alan Turing, considered to be the founding father of computing, is more often than not associated with the Bletchley Park codebreakers due to his enormous contribution to the top-secret code-breaking effort. 

It was with his work as part of the team of General Douglas MacArthur in the Philippines that he came to be an expert in decoding Japanese communications that Ronald Lynam became interested in Japanese culture. 

According to Donald Lynam, his father, who had a “great influence” on Wright, had a special relationship with his grandson and would often bring him souvenirs from his travels. Wright particularly cherished the Japanese banknotes used during Japan’s occupation of the Philippines given by his grandfather. 

“[My father] was almost a machine himself… with his brain ticking over with all of his plans and the things he wanted to build and do and so on. But with Craig, he could sit down and they would open up and talk to one another for hours,” Donald Lynam recalled.

With his father influencing Wright’s interest in Asian culture, specifically Japanese, Donald Lynam wasn’t surprised that Wright used Satoshi Nakamoto as a pseudonym to protect his privacy. 

“[Wright] said he felt that since it was a monetary system, it was important—and he didn’t know exactly where it would go, but it was important to protect the privacy of himself and his family,” Donald Lynam said.

“So being Satoshi Nakamoto was a surprise but not a shock. I asked him how did he come up with that name… I understood he was telling me it was two philosophers. One was of the ilk of Adam Smith—referring to Japanese philosopher Tominaga Nakamoto,” Donald Lynam added.

Donald Lynam’s testimony not only humanizes Wright, but also puts everything in perspective as it pertains to the Kleiman v Wright case—how the Satoshi Nakamoto pseudonym was born and how Wright had been working on the Bitcoin white paper months before its publication. 

“I have no doubts in my mind whatsoever that he was the sole creative author [of the Satsohi white paper]. That is not saying that other people don’t contribute to the open source software… but he’s the sole creative author… and I still have not seen anything of substance to shake me in that belief,” Donald Lynam concluded.

Wright comes from a line of highly respected military men who were not just soldiers of discipline, but also cryptographers who probably even worked with the great Alan Turing. While the defense is not discounting David Kleiman’s brilliance as a computer forensics expert, it is far different from being an expert in computer programming and cryptography—something that may have come naturally for Wright as the talent for it runs in his family.