While I think you are right about devirtualization being used to mean that in the world of compilers, in the realm of code protection/obfuscation, obfuscating code by making in run in an embedded virtual machine is called virtualization, with the reverse being called devirtualization.
It's hard to put a exact date on the origin of "[de]virtualization" being used to refer to code obfuscation, but it's definitely been used since at _least_ 2007 in related academia. [0],
[0]: Kang, Min Gyung, Pongsin Poosankam, and Heng Yin. "Renovo: A hidden code extractor for packed executables." Proceedings of the 2007 ACM workshop on Recurring malcode. 2007
It's hard to put a exact date on the origin of "[de]virtualization" being used to refer to code obfuscation, but it's definitely been used since at _least_ 2007 in related academia. [0],
[0]: Kang, Min Gyung, Pongsin Poosankam, and Heng Yin. "Renovo: A hidden code extractor for packed executables." Proceedings of the 2007 ACM workshop on Recurring malcode. 2007