Amir Taaki (; born 6 February 1988) is a British-Iranian anarchist revolutionary,

hacktivist Hacktivism (or hactivism; a portmanteau of '' hack'' and ''activism''), is the use of computer-based techniques such as hacking as a form of civil disobedience to promote a political agenda or social change. A form of Internet activism with roo ...

, and

programmer A programmer, computer programmer or coder is an author of computer source code someone with skill in computer programming. The professional titles Software development, ''software developer'' and Software engineering, ''software engineer' ...

who is known for his leading role in the

Bitcoin Bitcoin (abbreviation: BTC; Currency symbol, sign: ₿) is the first Decentralized application, decentralized cryptocurrency. Based on a free-market ideology, bitcoin was invented in 2008 when an unknown entity published a white paper under ...

project, and for pioneering many

open source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use and view the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open source model is a decentrali ...

projects. Forbes listed Taaki in their 30 Under 30 listing of 2014. Driven by the political philosophy of the

Rojava Rojava may refer to: * Syrian Kurdistan, also known as Rojava, the geographical region where Kurds historically settled within present-day Syria * Democratic Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria The Democratic Autonomous Administ ...

revolution, Taaki traveled to

Syria Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to Syria–Turkey border, the north, Iraq to Iraq–Syria border, t ...

, served in the YPG military, and worked in Rojava's civil society on various economic projects for a year and a half.

Biography

Amir Taaki was born 6 February 1988 in London, the eldest of three children of a Scottish-English mother and an Iranian father who is a property developer. Taaki grew up in nearby

Kent Kent is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Essex across the Thames Estuary to the north, the Strait of Dover to the south-east, East Sussex to the south-west, Surrey to the west, and Gr ...

. From an early age Taaki took an interest in computer technology, teaching himself

computer programming Computer programming or coding is the composition of sequences of instructions, called computer program, programs, that computers can follow to perform tasks. It involves designing and implementing algorithms, step-by-step specifications of proc ...

."Speakers 2011,"
11th International EPCA Summit, European Payments Consulting Association, www.epcaconference.com/ Retrieved 11 October 2011. After briefly attending two British universities, Taaki gravitated to the

free software Free software, libre software, libreware sometimes known as freedom-respecting software is computer software distributed open-source license, under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, distribut ...

movement. Taaki assisted in the creation of SDL Collide, an extension of Simple DirectMedia Layer, an open source

library A library is a collection of Book, books, and possibly other Document, materials and Media (communication), media, that is accessible for use by its members and members of allied institutions. Libraries provide physical (hard copies) or electron ...

used by video game developers. In 2009 and 2010, Taaki made his living as a professional

poker Poker is a family of Card game#Comparing games, comparing card games in which Card player, players betting (poker), wager over which poker hand, hand is best according to that specific game's rules. It is played worldwide, with varying rules i ...

player. His experience with

online gambling Online gambling (also known as iGaming or iGambling) is any kind of gambling conducted on the internet. This includes virtual poker, casinos, and sports betting. The first online gambling venue opened to the general public was ticketing for th ...

attracted him to the

project. At one point, he was listed among Bitcoin's main developers. He founded the first UK Bitcoin exchange, "Britcoin", which was succeeded in 2011 by a new British exchange called Intersango, in which he was a principal developer. Intersango has since closed. In 2012, Taaki organized the first Bitcoin conference in London. In 2014, together with

Cody Wilson Cody Rutledge Wilson (born January 31, 1988) is an American Right to keep and bear arms in the United States, gun rights activist and Crypto-anarchism, crypto-anarchist. He started Defense Distributed, a nonprofit organization, non-profit organ ...

, he launched the Dark Wallet project after a crowdfunding run on

IndieGoGo Indiegogo is an American crowdfunding website founded in 2008 by Danae Ringelmann, Slava Rubin, and Eric Schell. Its headquarters are in San Francisco, California. The site is one of the first sites to offer crowd funding. Indiegogo allows peo ...

which raised over $50,000. Taaki, along with other developers from Airbitz, a Bitcoin software company, created a prototype for a decentralised marketplace called "DarkMarket" in 2014, at a hackathon in Toronto, which was forked into the OpenBazaar project. As of 2013, he resided in an anarchist squat in the former anti- G8 HQ building in London, England. In 2015, Taaki went to

(Syrian Kurdistan) to offer his skills to the revolution and served the YPG military. He had no training but spent three and a half months in the YPG military fighting on the front. He was then discharged and worked in the civil society for over a year on various projects for Rojava's economics committee. In February 2018, Taaki created a group in

Catalonia Catalonia is an autonomous community of Spain, designated as a ''nationalities and regions of Spain, nationality'' by its Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia of 2006, Statute of Autonomy. Most of its territory (except the Val d'Aran) is situate ...

dedicated to leveraging

blockchain The blockchain is a distributed ledger with growing lists of Record (computer science), records (''blocks'') that are securely linked together via Cryptographic hash function, cryptographic hashes. Each block contains a cryptographic hash of th ...

technology to help national liberation causes such as the

Catalan independence movement The Catalan independence movement (; ; ) is a Social movement, social and political movement with roots in Catalan nationalism that seeks the independence of Catalonia from Spain. While proposals, organizations and individuals advocating for Ca ...

. In 2023, ''

Politico ''Politico'' (stylized in all caps), known originally as ''The Politico'', is an American political digital newspaper company founded by American banker and media executive Robert Allbritton in 2007. It covers politics and policy in the Unit ...

'' reported that Taaki was working on an anarchist project called DarkFi that aimed to allow people to form organizations that collectively raise and distribute money in complete secrecy. Taaki appears in the Bitcoin documentary Money Electric: The Bitcoin Mystery, released in October 2024. He has publicly disagreed with the film's theory of Peter Todd as

Satoshi Nakamoto Satoshi Nakamoto ( – 26 April 2011) is the name used by the presumed pseudonymous person or persons who developed bitcoin, authored the bitcoin white paper, and created and deployed bitcoin's original reference implementation. As part of the ...

References

External links

Personal website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Taaki, Amir 1988 births Military personnel from London Living people English computer programmers English people of Iranian descent People associated with Bitcoin Free software people Crypto-anarchists Poker players from London British anarchists 21st-century anarchists

Biography

See also

References

External links