Thursday morning, Newsweek published a story by Leah McGrath Goodman titled, “The Face Behind Bitcoin”, in which she laid out the story of Satoshi Nakamoto, a 64-year-old man living in a modest home in southern California.
According to the story, when Goodman asked Nakamoto about his involvement in Bitcoin, he said, “I am no longer involved in that and I cannot discuss it.” He continued, “It’s been turned over to other people. They are in charge of it now. I no longer have any connection.”
The story goes on to detail how Goodman and the magazine’s investigators tracked down Nakamoto, including the use of Social Security records and handwriting analysis by a team of MIT experts. Despite that investigation, the story started to unravel within hours.
Reporters went to Nakamoto’s home and after a period of time, Nakamoto emerged from his home asking AP reporter Ryan Nakashima to take him to lunch.
Over the two-hour lunch, Nakamoto denied any connection with Bitcoin while laying out the details of his life. According to the AP story, he kept referring to the digital currency as “bitcom.”
Nakamoto explained that he came to the United States in 1959 as an engineer who worked on projects for government agencies, as well as private companies. According to Nakamoto, he had to sign a non-disclosure agreement that prevented him from discussing his work in public. He said that when Newsweek quoted him as saying, “I’m no longer involved in that and I cannot discuss it,” he was misunderstood.
"I'm saying I'm no longer in engineering. That's it," said, Nakamoto to the AP. "And even if I was, when we get hired, you have to sign this document, contract saying you will not reveal anything we divulge during and after employment. So that's what I implied."
What is for sure is that Nakamoto will not get his modest, quiet life back anytime soon. Reporters will now dig into his history attempting to conclusively prove or disprove his involvement with Bitcoin.
This story was supposed to mark Newsweek’s big return but if the story proves to be false, that could spell disaster for the recently revamped magazine. Ominously, it took the AP only six hours after the Newsweek story was published to cast doubt on it.
What do you think? Did Newsweek get it all wrong or is Nakamoto trying to keep the anonymity and mystery of Bitcoin alive?