澳大利亞警方突襲 或爲搜尋比特幣發明者

SYDNEY, Australia — The Australian authorities on Wednesday raided the home of a computer expert and entrepreneur in suburban Sydney, just hours after two news outlets identified the man as a likely creator of the digital currency Bitcoin.

澳大利亞悉尼——本週三，澳大利亞當局在悉尼郊區搜查了一名電腦專家和創業者的住所，在那之前的幾個小時，有兩家新聞媒體稱這名男子可能是數字貨幣“比特幣”(Bitcoin)的發明者。

The Australian Federal Police said the raid on the residence of the man, Craig Steven Wright, was for a tax investigation, and a spokesman said it had no connection to the Bitcoin reports. The Australian Taxation Office, which asked the police to carry out the raid, declined to comment on “any individual’s or entity’s tax affairs.”

澳大利亞聯邦警察表示，該男子名爲克雷格·斯蒂文·萊特(Craig Steven Wright)，搜查其住所是爲了進行稅務調查，警方發言人表示此次行動和比特幣的新聞無關。而要求警方開展突襲行動的澳大利亞稅務局(Australian Taxation Office)拒絕對“任何個人或實體的稅務問題”置評。

The raid, in the leafy suburb of Gordon on Sydney’s upper north shore, came hours after reports in Wired magazine and Gizmodo drew strong links between Mr. Wright and Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous creator of the virtual currency that has grown to billions of dollars in total value.

這次突襲發生在悉尼上北海岸草木繁茂的郊區戈登(Gordon)，就在《連線》(Wired)雜誌和Gizmodo報道稱萊特和中本聰(Satoshi Nakamoto)之間有緊密聯繫的幾個小時之後。中本聰是比特幣發明者的假名，這種虛擬貨幣的總價值已增長到了數十億美元。

The identity of Mr. Nakamoto has been a mystery since the currency’s computer code was released in 2009, with several false leads having been aired and debunked. The growing value of Bitcoin, which is managed by computers that run its peer-to-peer software, has driven the search for its elusive creator or creators.

自2009年比特幣的計算機代碼發佈以來，中本聰的身份一直是個謎，先後傳出的幾條假線索也都被揭穿。比特幣是通過運行其點對點軟件的計算機來管理的，隨着它的價值日益增長，人們也一直在尋找它的的發明者。

Wired, which was first to identify Mr. Wright as a possible inventor of the currency, cited old blog posts as well as leaked documents and emails. The magazine acknowledged that the trail of clues could be a hoax, but it added: “If Wright is seeking to fake his Nakamoto connection, his hoax would be practically as ambitious as Bitcoin itself.”

《連線》率先指出萊特可能是比特幣的發明者之一，它引用了一些早前的博客文章以及泄露的文件和電郵作爲證據。該雜誌承認，這些線索可能是一個騙局，但它表示：“如果萊特試圖僞造出他和中本聰之間的聯繫，那麼這個騙局的高明程度不亞於比特幣本身。”

The Gizmodo report said that Mr. Wright and Dave Kleiman, an American who died in 2013, “were involved in the development of the digital currency.”

Gizmodo報道說，萊特和2013年去世的美國人戴夫·克萊曼(Dave Kleiman)“參與了這種電子貨幣的開發”。

Both outlets cited what was described as a transcript of a 2014 meeting among Mr. Wright, lawyers and tax officials, in which he is quoted as saying, “I did my best to try and hide the fact that I’ve been running Bitcoin since 2009.”

這兩家媒體都援引了一份記錄，據稱是2014年萊特與律師和稅務官員之間的會議記錄，其中萊特說，“我從2009年開始，一直在管理比特幣，我盡了最大努力來隱瞞這個事實。”

“By the end of this, I think half the world is going to bloody know,” he added, according to the transcript.

記錄顯示，他說：“經過這件事之後，我覺得全世界有一半的人都會知道了。”

Efforts to reach Mr. Wright on Wednesday were unsuccessful.

本週三我們多番試圖聯繫萊特，但均未成功。

A Newsweek investigation in 2014 incorrectly identified the Bitcoin creator as Dorian Satoshi Nakamoto, a physicist living with his mother in Southern California. He denied the report, saying he had only learned of Bitcoin weeks earlier after a reporter contacted his son.

《新聞週刊》(Newsweek)在2014年刊發的一篇調查文章誤認爲多利安·中本聰(Dorian Satoshi Nakamoto)是比特幣的創造者。此人是一名物理學家，與母親住在南加州，他否認了那篇報道的說法，稱幾周之前一名記者聯繫他兒子時，他才聽說比特幣這種東西。