Calibra - A Connected Wallet for a Connected World

Calibra was founded in 2019 with the mission of making money work for everyone. We believe that all people, all over the world should have equal, easy and educated access to financial services. Calibra is designed for Libra, a new cryptocurrency. The Calibra app is built on innovative blockchain technology to enable people to move their money more freely, securely and affordably in their day-to-day lives. It will be available globally.

As well as being a standalone app available on iOS and Android, Calibra will integrate the Calibra wallet into Facebook platforms like WhatsApp and Messenger. This means Facebook's 2.7 billion users will be able to access Calibra's functionality through apps they already use. Offering this integrated service alongside the Calibra standalone app helps make financial services more accessible to more people.

The Calibra company is a subsidiary of Facebook, Inc. Calibra operates independently from Facebook. Calibra is headquartered in Menlo Park.

Introducing Libra

The world truly needs a reliable digital currency and infrastructure that together can deliver on the promise of “the internet of money.”

Securing your financial assets on your mobile device should be simple and intuitive. Moving money around globally should be as easy and cost-effective as — and even more safe and secure than — sending a text message or sharing a photo, no matter where you live, what you do, or how much you earn. New product innovation and additional entrants to the ecosystem will enable the lowering of barriers to access and cost of capital for everyone and facilitate frictionless payments for more people.

Now is the time to create a new kind of digital currency built on the foundation of blockchain technology. The mission for Libra is a simple global currency and financial infrastructure that empowers billions of people. Libra is made up of three parts that will work together to create a more inclusive financial system:

1. It is built on a secure, scalable, and reliable blockchain;

2. It is backed by a reserve of assets designed to give it intrinsic value;

3. It is governed by the independent Libra Association tasked with evolving the ecosystem.

The Libra currency is built on the “Libra Blockchain.” Because it is intended to address a global audience, the software that implements the Libra Blockchain is open source designed so that anyone can build on it, and billions of people can depend on it for their financial needs. Imagine an open, interoperable ecosystem of financial services that developers and organizations will build to help people and businesses hold and transfer Libra for everyday use. With the proliferation of smartphones and wireless data, increasingly more people will be online and able to access Libra through these new services. To enable the Libra ecosystem to achieve this vision over time, the blockchain has been built from the ground up to prioritize scalability, security, efficiency in storage and throughput, and future adaptability.

Blockchains are described as either permissioned or permissionless in relation to the ability to participate as a validator node. In a “permissioned blockchain,” access is granted to run a validator node. In a “permissionless blockchain,” anyone who meets the technical requirements can run a validator node. In that sense, Libra will start as a permissioned blockchain.

To ensure that Libra is truly open and always operates in the best interest of its users, our ambition is for the Libra network to become permissionless. The challenge is that as of today we do not believe that there is a proven solution that can deliver the scale, stability, and security needed to support billions of people and transactions across the globe through a permissionless network. One of the association’s directives will be to work with the community to research and implement this transition, which will begin within five years of the public launch of the Libra Blockchain and ecosystem.

Essential to the spirit of Libra, in both its permissioned and permissionless state, the Libra Blockchain will be open to everyone: any consumer, developer, or business can use the Libra network, build products on top of it, and add value through their services. Open access ensures low barriers to entry and innovation and encourages healthy competition that benefits consumers. This is foundational to the goal of building more inclusive financial options for the world.

The Libra Blockchain

The goal of the Libra Blockchain is to serve as a solid foundation for financial services, including a new global currency, which could meet the daily financial needs of billions of people. Through the process of evaluating existing options, we decided to build a new blockchain based on these three requirements: Able to scale to billions of accounts, which requires high transaction throughput, low latency, and an efficient, high-capacity storage system. Highly secure, to ensure safety of funds and financial data. * Flexible, so it can power the Libra ecosystem’s governance as well as future innovation in financial services.

The Libra Blockchain is designed from the ground up to holistically address these requirements and build on the learnings from existing projects and research — a combination of innovative approaches and well-understood techniques. This next section will highlight three decisions regarding the Libra Blockchain:

1. Designing and using the Move programming language.

2. Using a Byzantine Fault Tolerant (BFT) consensus approach.

3. Adopting and iterating on widely adopted blockchain data structures.

What’s Next for Libra?

The Libra Blockchain:

Over the coming months, the association will work with the community to gather feedback on the Libra Blockchain prototype and bring it to a production-ready state. In particular, this work will focus on ensuring the security, performance, and scalability of the protocol and implementation.

• The Libra Association will construct well-documented APIs and libraries to enable users to interact with the Libra Blockchain.
• The Libra Association will create a framework for the collaborative development of the technology behind the Libra Blockchain using the open-source methodology. Procedures will be created for discussing and reviewing changes to the protocol and software that support the blockchain.
• The association will perform extensive testing of the blockchain, which range from tests of the protocol to constructing a full-scale test of the network in collaboration with entities such as wallet services and exchanges to ensure the system is working before launch.
• The association will work to foster the development of the Move language and determine a path for third parties to create smart contracts once language development has stabilized — after the launch of the Libra ecosystem.

Together with the community, the association will research the technological challenges on the path to a permissionless ecosystem so that we can meet the objective to begin the transition within five years of the launch.

The Reserve:

• The association will work to establish a geographically distributed and regulated group of global institutional custodians for the reserve.
• The association will establish operational procedures for the reserve to interact with authorized resellers and ensure high-transparency and auditability.
• The association will establish policies and procedures that establish how the association can change the composition of the reserve basket.

The Libra Association:

• We will work to grow the Libra Association Council to around 100 geographically distributed and diverse members, all serving as the initial validator nodes of the Libra Blockchain.
• The association will develop and adopt a comprehensive charter and set of bylaws for the association on the basis of the currently proposed governance structure.
• We will recruit a Managing Director for the association and work with her/him to continue hiring for the association’s executive team.
• We will identify social impact partners aligned with our joint mission and will work with them to establish a Social Impact Advisory Board and a social impact program.