Adam Back
Adam Back is an internationally recognized cryptographer and cypherpunk. Back was known as an early pioneer of the digital currency movement prior to his involvement in the Bitcoin space. In 1997, he created Hashcash, a method of defending against denial-of-service attacks using a proof-of-work algorithm. Years later, this development laid the groundwork for Bitcoin's mining capabilities. Satoshi Nakamoto's original Bitcoin white paper mentions his work
Back was born in July 1970 in London, England. A Sinclair ZX81 was his first computer. He learned Basic and spent his time reverse engineering video games and looking for decryption keys in software packages. He finished A levels in advanced mathematics, physics, and economics.
He holds a PhD in computer science from the University of Exeter in distributed systems. During his PhD, Back worked with compilers to semi-automate the use of parallel computers. He developed an interest in pgp encryption, electronic money, and remailers. After graduation, Adam worked as an applied cryptography consultant in start-ups and larger corporations, writing cryptographic libraries and designing, reviewing, and breaking other people's cryptographic protocols.
Back, like Wei Dai, David Chaum, and Hal Finney, was an early pioneer of digital asset research. Back created Hashcash in 1997.
Credlib, a library that implements Stefan Brands' credential systems, was also created by him. He was the first to define the "non-interactive forward secrecy security property for email", noting that any identity-based encryption scheme can be used to provide non-interactive forward secrecy.
He is also known for advocating for the use of ultra-compact code, such as his 2-line and 3-line RSA in Perl signature files, as well as non-exportable T-shirts to protest cryptography export regulations.
Adam Back was one of the first people to receive an e-mail from Satoshi Nakamoto with an insight into the early development of Bitcoin and the ideas and motivations behind it. Back, along with Nick Szabo and Hal Finney, was named as a possible Nakamoto candidate by the Financial Times in 2016. Craig Wright had sued Back for claiming that he was not Nakamoto, but Wright later dropped the suit.
As a backup for the traditional internet, Adam Back has advocated for the use of satellites and mesh networks to broadcast and receive bitcoin transactions. Back was appointed CEO of Blockstream on October 3, 2016. Since then, he has released the Liquid sidechain, Blockstream Mining Notes, mining colocation services, the Jade hardware wallet, and the Core Lightning implementation.
Back's collaboration with Blockstream propelled the crypto space forward in 2020. His company achieved a number of milestones, including significant upgrades to its satellite network and initiatives to expand its Liquid sidechain ecosystem. The Liquid Network received its first general-purpose Javascript library in July, allowing external developers to begin constructing a more robust environment around the project. In September, a decentralized exchange based on the Liquid Network became available for early access.
