XRP News Today: XRP Ledger May Predate Bitcoin by Two Years

Crypto analyst Edo Farina has shared a compelling thread that challenges the conventional understanding of the origin of blockchain technology. According to Farina, the XRP Ledger (XRPL) may have been in existence before Bitcoin, with its technical infrastructure and domain activity dating back to 2007, two years before Bitcoin’s genesis block was mined on January 3, 2009.

The domain XRPL.org, which is now the core documentation site for the XRP Ledger, was active as early as January 2007 and was hosted at the IP address 64.20.43.107. This revelation suggests that the foundational codebase of XRP was already in development well before Satoshi Nakamoto launched Bitcoin. Several other crypto-related domains were also hosted on the same IP address during that period, including RippleTrade.com, Bitcoin.com, CraigWright.net, and Smsz.net, which was linked to Mark Karpeles of Mt. Gox. This shared hosting footprint indicates early collaboration or at least a shared technical infrastructure among key actors in the early crypto space, long before Bitcoin officially debuted.

Ripple’s history did not begin in 2012, as many believe, when Chris Larsen and Jed McCaleb rebranded it as OpenCoin. The company’s roots go back to 2004 when developer Ryan Fugger launched RipplePay, a decentralized online payment protocol. This platform laid the philosophical and technical groundwork for what would become the XRP Ledger, an energy-efficient, scalable blockchain that uses a consensus protocol instead of Bitcoin’s energy-intensive proof-of-work.

Farina also highlights Ripple Communications, one of Ripple Labs’ 13 federally registered trademarks, which was registered in 1991. This indicates that the brand’s institutional presence predates the blockchain revolution by decades. Ripple Communications has direct engagement with the U.S. intelligence community, as evidenced by Darcy Kohn from Ripple Communications contacting the Intelligence and National Security Alliance (INSA), ODNI, and other U.S. agencies to solicit participation in tech showcases. Suzanne Wilson Heckenberg, who served as Director of Marketing for Ripple Communications and is now President of INSA, further supports this relationship.

This deeper historical context suggests that XRP was not merely an alternative to Bitcoin but a parallel and possibly preparatory effort to shape the future of digital finance. XRP’s foundational work appears to have begun well before Bitcoin, supported by long-standing technological, legal, and even governmental ties. Edo Farina’s investigation reshapes the timeline and invites a reconsideration of XRP’s role in the broader crypto ecosystem. Far from being a reaction to Bitcoin, XRP may have been designed to surpass it.