A Channel 4 documentary is aiming to shed light on the elusive figure behind Bitcoin’s inception.
Journalist Gabriel Gatehouse investigates the man behind the coin, who goes by the pseudonym ‘Satoshi Nakamoto’ and tries to understand why the currency was created in the first place.
While there are almost no clues to Satoshi’s identity, the former BBC journalist noticed that the anonymous figure used British English in his writing, rather than American English spelling.
In the first episode of Seeking Satoshi: The Mystery Bitcoin Creator, which was released on YouTube on Monday, Gabriel spoke to Mike Lorry, who claimed to have been there in the early days of crypto.
Mike claimed he could put the nameless founder down to ‘one of a half dozen people’ before he started rattling off names of potential candidates.
He claimed the elusive Satoshi could be any from the following selection of names: Hal Finney, Wei Dai, Nick Zabo, Ralph Merkle, Mike Lorrey or Adam Beck.
Gabriel noted that the only British man on his list was indeed Adam, which would explain the British spellings.
Meanwhile he later spotted another clue with links to the UK, as a Times headline buried in the Bitcoin source code.
Journalist Gabriel Gatehouse investigates the man behind the Bitcoin, who goes by the pseudonym ‘Satoshi Nakamoto’ and tries to understand why the currency was created in the first place
He said: ‘At some point, I thought maybe I can crack this whole case by reading T-shirts, “Chancellor on The Brink of Second Bailout For Banks”, this bland headline from The Times of London, Satoshi had buried it in the Bitcoin source code.
‘It was a message in a bottle, from the very beginning Bitcoin coin was a political project.’
Adam is a British cryptographer and CEO of Blockstream, which he co-founded in 2014. He invented Hashcash, which is used in the Bitcoin mining process.
The broadcaster reached out to Adam, however after failing to get a response he flew to a conference that he was speaking at in Miami.
Sneaking into a VIP area after the talk, the journalist hoped to get a chance to speak to Adam but was quickly removed by staff.
As well as shedding light on Satoshi’s true identity, the documentary aimed to understand crypto’s political ambitions.
Gabriel said: ‘The first anyone heard of Bitcoin was in October 2008. It was the financial crisis the markets were in meltdown, someone posted a paper on a internet forum called the cryptography mailing list.
‘They said they invested a new sort of money, a kind of digital gold that could be sent over the internet, cutting out the banks.
Adam Back is a British cryptographer and CEO of Blockstream, which he co-founded in 2014. He invented Hashcash, which is used in the bitcoin mining process
While there are almost no clues to Satoshi’s identity, the former BBC journalist noticed that the anonymous figure used British English in his writing, rather the American English
Meanwhile he later spotted another clue with links to the UK, a Times of London headline buried in the Bitcoin source code
Speaking to a guest at the Miami conference the host heard how Bitcoin might of started as ‘a revolution’ to transform the world as we know it.
The guest said: ‘I was learning about the federal reserve and how like evil our money system is and Bitcoin seemed like a real answer to that and that’s how it started.
‘All these nerds who were like ”oh my god this might be the best shot we have at a nonviolent revolution…we’re about to hit the debt ceiling, inflation is through the roof and if we don’t have an alternative to that everybody’s f***ed.’
The documentary suggested a potential conspiracy among Silicon Valley elites to obscure the true identity of Satoshi and to undermine democracy.
Seeking Satoshi: The Mystery Bitcoin Creator is set to air on YouTube as five, 20-minute films, before being stitched together and broadcast on TV as a feature-length documentary at the beginning of March.
This release follows HBO’s documentary Money Electric: The Bitcoin Mystery, which claimed that Bitcoin developer Peter Todd might be Nakamoto.
Todd is not among the usual suspects alleged to have launched the first decentralised cryptocurrency in 2008 – but a filmmaker says his credentials and early involvement in Bitcoin ‘lines up’ with what we know about the elusive Satoshi.
The 39-year-old vehemently denied being the anonymous founder hours before ‘Money Electric: the Bitcoin Mystery’ aired, dismissing the claims as ‘crazy theories’.
Peter Todd was sensationally suggested to be the mastermind behind Bitcoin in the new HBO doc
Todd became involved in the world of crypto when he was 15, he previously told a podcast
He has been involved in Bitcoin since its founding as a core developer, however, and acknowledges having ‘deep insights’ into Bitcoin in the early days.
In the closing scenes of the documentary, he says, ‘Well yeah, I’m Satoshi Nakamoto’ – apparently an expression of solidarity with the anonymous founder’s privacy bid.
Filmmaker Cullen Hoback told the New York Times he was convinced that Todd was behind the incredibly successfully cryptocurrency, however.
‘I’m very convinced,’ he told Kevin Roose.
‘Based on the evidence, I believe Peter Todd was Satoshi. He may have let others in on the secret, but everything lines up with him.’
While Todd is not among those usually named, his involvement in the early days of Bitcoin make him a viable candidate, followers say.
Castle Island Ventures Founding Partner Nic Carter told POLITICO: ‘He is one of the most important bitcoiners, from a technical perspective.’
‘Generally speaking, people consider his views on bitcoin as very important.’
One Bitcoin at the time of writing is worth $63,126.50
But Carter doubted the allegations Todd was Satoshi.
‘There’s no bigger mystery in history,’ he said. ‘I personally hope we never find out who Satoshi is.’
Todd dismisses the association as ‘ludicrous’, claiming he was ‘too busy with school and work’ to have been involved.
Believed to be one of the few people who communicated with Nakamoto prior to his disappearance from online chats in 2011, Todd would have been 23 when Nakamoto first published Bitcoin’s white paper.
He said he became involved in the world of crypto when he was 15.
In his later career, Todd also worked as chief scientist at Mastercoin – a digital currency and communications protocol built on the Bitcoin blockchain.
He went on to assume the role of chief scientist at Dark Wallet, an open-source Bitcoin wallet.
In 2016, he set up cryptographic keys to secure wallets and blockchain protocol for Zcash, a cryptocurrency based on Bitcoin’s codebase.
It is not clear what became of Satoshi Nakamoto in that time, having only had direct involvement in Bitcoin until the start of the last decade.
Followers of the cryptocurrency have tried to identify the elusive founder – worth an estimated $69bn if still in control of their bitcoin wallet – for years, without any serious progress.
The name Satoshi itself means wise in Japanese. Some have suggested it could refer to a group, rather than an individual, joined in common purpose.
Last year, it emerged Apple Mac computers contain a hidden manifesto dedicated to Bitcoin – reigniting speculation after it was suggested Steve Jobs may have been behind the cryptocurrency.
The discovery was made by tech blogger Andy Baio and prompted speculation that the Bitcoin founder and Apple genius were somehow related.
Separately Jason Williams, author of Bitcoin: Hard Money You Can’t F*ck With, said on the platform: ‘Steve Jobs is Satoshi Nakamoto. I am serious.’
However others were quick to point out that Apple temporarily banned Bitcoin from its app store in 2014 amid concern over volatile cryptocurrencies.