[qsucvatz]

It was announced at the depths of the financial crisis, October 2008, when cornerstone institutions were declaring bankrupcy every weekend.

It was running by January.

Equation Group.

[marshray]

I think NSA would have foreseen the inevitability of FPGA and ASIC miners and chosen a better proof-of-work function than SHA-2.

[solotronics]

also the equation group already released an earlier paper on cryptographic currencies