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Did you know that your Mac computer has a hidden treasure inside? If you are running macOS Catalina or later, you can access the original Bitcoin white paper by Satoshi Nakamoto with a simple command in the Terminal app.
The Bitcoin white paper is a nine-page document that describes the technical specifications and motivations of the first cryptocurrency. In 2008 someone or some group called Satoshi Nakamoto released the document that started a fintech revolution.
As the white paper demonstrates Bitcoin acts as a peer-to-peer electronic cash system that eliminates any middlemen or authorities. As it depicts, transactions are authenticated and recorded in a public ledger called the blockchain and users receive new bitcoins for their involvement.
As the white paper also covers, existing payment systems have some challenges and limitations, such as double-spending, scalability, privacy and security. It proposes a novel solution based on cryptographic proof-of-work digital signatures and network consensus.
The white paper is widely seen as one of the most impactful and groundbreaking works in the cryptocurrency movement. Over 12,000 citations and tens of thousands of article mentions have been given to it since it was released12. It is also accessible in many languages and formats online.
Still, not many people know that Apple has secretly embedded the white paper in its modern macOS operating system. This was discovered by a Twitter user named 
To get the white paper on your Mac, you have to do these things: Launch the Terminal app (it’s in Applications > Utilities or you can use Spotlight to find it).
Enter this command: shasum -a 256 /System/Library/CoreServices/Finder.app/Contents/Resources/Finder.icns | awk ‘{print $1}’ | xxd -r -p | gunzip
Press Enter and chill for a few seconds.
You should see the white paper appear on your screen.
You can also save the white paper as a PDF file by adding this command after the previous one: | open -f -a Preview
The reason why this works is because Apple has cleverly hidden the white paper inside one of its system icons. The Finder.icns file is an icon file that contains various images of the Finder app. It also has a squeezed version of the white paper coded in hexadecimal.
The command above basically extracts the hexadecimal code from the icon file converts it to binary, decompresses it and displays it as plain text. The PDF command opens the text file in Preview and saves it as a PDF document.
It is not clear why Apple decided to include the white paper in its macOS system. Some think that it was a homage to Satoshi Nakamoto or a wink to the Bitcoin community. Others suggest that it was a prank or an Easter egg by some Apple developers.
Whatever the reason it is a fascinating discovery that shows how Bitcoin has permeated our culture and technology. The next time you use your Mac you might want to take a peek at this hidden gem and appreciate the genius of Satoshi Nakamoto.