HBO Bitcoin Documentary: Peter Todd Says He’s Not Satoshi Nakamomto

Software developer Peter Todd wants to send a message to HBO and viewers of one of its new films: He didn’t invent Bitcoin.

“I am not Satoshi,” Todd said in an email to Bloomberg, denying that he is the true identity of the pseudonymous cryptocurrency pioneer Satoshi Nakamoto.

In Money Electric: The Bitcoin Mystery, filmmaker Cullen Hoback used circumstantial evidence to suggest that Todd was Nakamoto. For example, in one instance the film says that Nakamoto may have accidentally used Todd’s Internet message-board account to continue a post started earlier under Nakamoto’s username.

Todd told Bloomberg that at the time the posts were published, his own account was actually named “retep,” and people didn’t know the poster’s identity. Most users of the Bitcoin message board where Satoshi Nakamoto discussed Bitcoin used anonymous names. If Todd had slipped up in continuing Nakamoto’s post with the “retep” account, he said he could have simply stopped using that account and created a new one to post under his own name. Instead, Todd later renamed the retep account to his own name.

“If Cullen had actually wanted to find Satoshi, he could have easily fact-checked this,” Todd said in the email. “Based on what has happened and his behavior I strongly suspect that naming me as Satoshi was just a marketing ploy to drum up attention for his documentary.” Todd called Cullen’s film a “threadbare, circumstantial, coincidence based approach to trying to find Satoshi.”

A representative for HBO didn’t immediately return a request for comment.

Todd said the documentary’s revelations are making him worry about his safety, in large part because wallets belonging to the real Satoshi Nakamoto still hold around 1 million Bitcoin, worth about $62 billion at current prices.

“Obviously, falsely accusing someone of having tens of billions of dollars puts them at risk from robbery and kidnappings,” Todd said. “He’s putting my life at risk to promote his movie.”

Who exactly Nakamoto is — either a single person or a group — has been subject of much speculation since Bitcoin’s launch in January 2009. The cryptocurrency has since burst into the mainstream, ending up on the books of companies like MicroStrategy Inc. and purchased by US exchange-traded funds that hold billions of dollars worth of the token.

Over the years, various publications have suggested a variety of people were Satoshi Nakamoto. In 2014, Newsweek claimed it was physicist Dorian Nakamoto, who denied it. In 2015, the New York Times pointed the finger at computer scientist Nick Szabo. Australian Craig Wright famously proclaimed himself to be Satoshi Nakamoto, until a UK judge ruled he is not Bitcoin’s creator.