Cøbra Can't Fight $700K Craig Wright Legal Fees as an Anon, UK Judge Rules Again

A London High Court Judge connected Monday upheld a erstwhile ruling that Bitcoin.org website operators, including the pseudonymous Cøbra, indispensable springiness up their individuality to debar hefty ineligible fees levied by self-proclaimed Bitcoin inventor Craig Wright.

Wright served ineligible papers connected Cøbra successful April 2021 implicit the copyright of Bitcoin's whitepaper, the fashionable cryptocurrency's manifesto. The Australian machine idiosyncratic who has agelong claimed to beryllium its pseudonymous writer Satoshi Nakamoto, accused operators of the Bitcoin.org outgo network's website of infringing his rights by publishing the achromatic paper. Wright claimed that, arsenic Satoshi, helium owned the copyright to the Bitcoin manifesto.

After Cøbra was a no-show successful court, a justice ordered the achromatic insubstantial to beryllium taken down from the website. Then, erstwhile Cøbra attempted to situation Wright's petition 568,516.42 pounds ($704,500) successful ineligible fees, a London High Court Judge ruled successful November that successful bid to situation the costs, Cøbra had to place themselves.

On Monday, London High Court Justice Richard Smith dismissed Cøbra's entreaty connected the November ruling saying that, though determination are respective reasons wherefore parties would legally petition anonymity, including menace to life, Cøbra's reasons for not identifying themselves seemed "not lone unworkable but besides risked undermining the precise principles of earthy justice" due to the fact that they sought to stay anonymous "not lone against the nationalist astatine large, but against the Claimant [Wright] and the tribunal arsenic well."

Pseudonymous characters that are salient assemblage members, developers oregon influencers are commonplace successful the crypto world, which whitethorn explicate Cøbra's combat to enactment anonymous. Meanwhile, Wright is pursuing multiple lawsuits astir the satellite implicit the Bitcoin whitepaper, and adjacent libel implicit claims that helium is Satoshi.

Lawyers for Wright told CoinDesk connected Monday that they are awaiting an bid connected adjacent steps, including whether Cøbra is present required to wage up successful full. Legal representatives for Cøbra did not instantly respond to a CoinDesk petition for comment.