How Facebook’s New Blockchain Might Revolutionize Our Digital Identities
The Libra cryptocurrency was unveiled on a wave of hype and speculation. But what its white paper suggested about Facebook’s vision for how we manage our identifying credentials may be just as important.
By Mike Orcutt
Last week, after months of hype and speculation, Facebook finally revealed its plan to launch a blockchain system, called Libra. Since the launch, most of the attention has focused on Libra coin, the cryptocurrency that will run on the new blockchain.
But tucked away in one of the documents Facebook published is something that may turn out to be just as important as the coin — if not more so. A major goal of the Libra Association, the nonprofit Facebook has created to manage the project’s development, is to use Libra to revolutionize the concept of digital identity.
The relevant passage lives near the bottom of a document meant to explain the role of the Libra Association: “An additional goal of the association is to develop and promote an open identity standard. We believe that decentralized and portable digital identity is a prerequisite to financial inclusion and competition.”
