March 06, 2014
A reporter for Newsweek says she’s unmasked the mysterious Japanese-American man responsible for inventing Bitcoin, the world’s most widely used digital cryptocurrency.
In an article published on the magazine’s website Thursday morning, Leah McGrath Goodman recalled the events of a two-month investigation she undertook recently in an attempt to unearth facts about Satoshi Nakamoto, the man who invented Bitcoin in 2008 but has avoided the media entirely ever since. Nakamoto, however, has denied being its inventor.
Goodman says that Nakamoto is a 64-year-old resident of Temple City, California, but has not used his birth name for the better part of four decades. Instead, she wrote, he’s managed to keep an incredibly low profile under the pseudonym Dorian S. Nakamoto.
At least up until her article went live early Thursday. Within hours Goodman’s scoop was being discussed across all corners of the internet, and before the morning ended there were reportedly journalists camped out in front of Nakamoto’s Southern California home anxious to learn more about one of the most mysterious men on the internet.
If Goodman’s attempt to do as much is any indication, however, then journalists will likely encounter anything but an easy time in trying to dig deeper. In her article, Goodman wrote that she was barely able to get any information from the man, and only managed to speak with him face-to-face after he called the cops on her.
“He thinks if he talks to you he’s going to get into trouble,” one of the police officers allegedly told Goodman.
“I don’t think he’s in any trouble,” she fired back. “I would like to ask him about Bitcoin.”