Like today, there were a handful of providers of anonymous hosting and domain service. Satoshi registered the domain and hosted the website via anonymousspeech.com. So no, it's not possible to obtain his identity directly from the domain name.
But there is a potential flaw - anonymousspeech.com used to accept cash-in-mail, but stopped for a while, then started accepting cash again. It is unclear whether Satoshi used cash, or credit card/bank transfer. If he used the latter one for payment, the government can just subpoena all the financial records. But there are evidences to believed he used anonymous deposit. So the answer is still no.
IMHO, by today's standard, Satoshi Nakamoto's anonymity is flawed. A large portion of the infrastructure for anonymity and privacy (Bitcoin!!) didn't exist back to that time, in addition, he didn't demonstrate the extreme rigorous practice of operational security similar to underground blackhat hacking groups, for example, he was using GMX as his main mailbox, which was not known for its security, and obviously it was eventually hacked, etc.
In conclusion, he did enough to obtain a reasonable degree of 2008's anonymity. But his anonymity is saved only because it wasn't/isn't illegal so he wasn't a target in the beginning, and by now time has buried all the traces. It probably won't survive a coordinated takedown by multiple law enforcement agencies (something you can accomplish with a fair chance of success today).
bcaa7f3a8bbc|7 years ago
But there is a potential flaw - anonymousspeech.com used to accept cash-in-mail, but stopped for a while, then started accepting cash again. It is unclear whether Satoshi used cash, or credit card/bank transfer. If he used the latter one for payment, the government can just subpoena all the financial records. But there are evidences to believed he used anonymous deposit. So the answer is still no.
IMHO, by today's standard, Satoshi Nakamoto's anonymity is flawed. A large portion of the infrastructure for anonymity and privacy (Bitcoin!!) didn't exist back to that time, in addition, he didn't demonstrate the extreme rigorous practice of operational security similar to underground blackhat hacking groups, for example, he was using GMX as his main mailbox, which was not known for its security, and obviously it was eventually hacked, etc.
In conclusion, he did enough to obtain a reasonable degree of 2008's anonymity. But his anonymity is saved only because it wasn't/isn't illegal so he wasn't a target in the beginning, and by now time has buried all the traces. It probably won't survive a coordinated takedown by multiple law enforcement agencies (something you can accomplish with a fair chance of success today).
solarkraft|7 years ago
I'm also sure he connected to the site through proxies.