While Facebook’s Libra cryptocurrency project is still facing regulatory backlash from regulators across the world, Patrick Ellis, a member of the project’s governing board told Reuters on Thursday that Libra will still go live in 2020, but they currently have no solid plans on how the launch will take place.
According to Ellis, who is one of five board members of the Geneva-based Libra Association: “At this stage, there is no strategy set in stone for the markets or the product, or how it will actually get rolled out.”
The fear of the Libra project being available to Facebook’s 2.4 billion users has caused great concern among regulators. They believe that the cryptocurrency would not only facilitate money laundering but could also disrupt the global financial system once Libra is launched.
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Users’ data privacy is Facebook’s Achilles heel. The social media giant has suffered several data breaches, which affected millions of users on the platform. Earlier this week, Facebook reportedly suffered another massive data leak affecting about 267 million users.
In July, the Swiss Data Privacy Authority demanded more information about the Libra project. The regulator expects the Libra association to assess the project to find out the data protection risks associated with the cryptocurrency and what measures could be taken to minimize the risks.
Following the continuous regulatory saga, Libra lost some of its key partners including Paypal, Visa, and MasterCard.
However, despite all the controversies surrounding the project, David Mark, the leader of the Libra project, said in July that the company will still launch the cryptocurrency next year, but not until it has cleared all regulatory issues even if it means not meeting up with the scheduled launch date.
When Reuters asked Ellis if they will still launch the cryptocurrency in 2020, he said ‘Yes. Yes, it’ll launch. It’s just too early to put a solid strategy in place. We have still got so much to solve with the regulators in order to be able to then refine the strategy for launch.”
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