In an exclusive report, Newsweek identified a 64-year-old Japanese-American physicist as being the mysterious person known as "Satoshi Nakamoto" behind the Bitcoin revolution.
However the man, who told the Associated Press news agency his name is Dorian Prentice Satoshi Nakamoto, told reporters outside his modest two-story house in suburban Los Angeles: "I'm not involved in Bitcoin."
Since its 2009 launch, the Bitcoin phenomenon has been hailed as a financial revolution, despite scandals over its use in drug trafficking and money laundering.
He said he phoned police when the magazine's reporter knocked on his door.
While acknowledging that some of the biographical details in the Newsweek report were true, Nakamoto denied its claim that he was "the face behind Bitcoin."
But Newsweek stood by its story, saying his career involved classified work as a systems engineer for the US government and that he initially tacitly acknowledged his role in creating the crypto-currency that has rocked the banking world.