Facebook's Secretive Cryptocurrency Payment System Is Apparently Code-Named 'Project Libra'
By Catie Keck
Facebookcoin, or whatever we’re calling it, is reportedly getting even closer to becoming a reality.
Following previous reports that such an project was underway, the Wall Street Journal,
citing sources familiar with the matter, reported Thursday that
Facebook has been in talks with “dozens” of financial groups about its
super-secret cryptocurrency initiative, which is apparently code-named
“Project Libra.” Take from that information whatever you wish.
According
to the Journal, Facebook sees the project as a way to further integrate
itself into the lives of its users—no surprise there—by developing a
coin that can be used on Facebook and across the internet as easily as
users use their Facebook credentials as login information for other
websites and services. Unsurprisingly, because this is Facebook, the
company is also reportedly looking at ways to link the project to ads:
One idea being considered is that users could click ads to buy a product and pay with Facebook tokens, which the retailer could then recycle to pay for more ads, one person said. Facebook rolled out a similar feature—using dollars and traditional card payments—on Instagram, which it owns, in March.
Facebook has reportedly met with
Visa, Mastercard, and other financial firms about the project and is
hoping to secure investments of roughly $1 billion, which the Journal’s
sources said is intended to support the value of the coin and protect it
against the volatility standard of cryptocurrency.
“Like
many other companies Facebook is exploring ways to leverage the power
of blockchain technology,” a company spokesperson told Gizmodo by email,
reciting a statement
the company has previously given about the project. “This new small
team is exploring many different applications. We don’t have anything
further to share.”
Bloomberg previously reported in December that Facebook was developing a cryptocurrency for its subsidiary WhatsApp, and the New York Times reported in February that Facebook had met with cryptocurrency exchanges about its plans for the coin.
Recode
reported in May last year that Facebook had assembled a blockchain
division and was moving a number of company executives over to the
project, including David Marcus, who had been leading the Messenger team
prior to the shift. In announcing his departure from that division in a
Facebook post
at the time, Marcus wrote that he would be “setting up a small group to
explore how to best leverage Blockchain across Facebook, starting from
scratch.”
In January of last year, Mark Zuckerberg wrote on Facebook
that he was “interested to go deeper and study the positive and
negative aspects of [encryption and cryptocurrency] technologies, and
how best to use them in our services.” Interestingly, his site just
weeks later banned ads
that promoted “financial products and services that are frequently
associated with misleading or deceptive promotional practices,”
including binary options, initial coin offerings, and—you guessed
it—cryptocurrency.
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