Facebook’s yet to be released digital currency libra has been forked into a decentralized project called OpenLibra.

First announced at the Ethereum Foundation’s DevCon 5 conference in Osaka Japan, on Oct. 9, the OpenLibra project is being billed as an “open platform for financial inclusion” with an emphasis on the currency being “Not run by Facebook.”

Seeing #openlibra publicly announced for the first time is sending shivers down my spine. I am so excited about this initiative to “lock the door open” for libra tech. @geiger_lucas on the main stage at #devcon5 https://t.co/EdLqKm75K3 pic.twitter.com/9DAH8aPl2S — Lane Rettig (@lrettig) October 9, 2019

OpenLibra is a technical hard fork of the social media platform’s forthcoming currency that will function as a permissionless, decentralized cryptocurrency. The developers behind the project claim that OpenLibra will be compatible with its Facebook counterpart, meaning there can be an overlap in application usage between the two networks. OpenLibra’s value will also be pegged to that of libra, which is reportedly a stablecoin based upon multiple fiat currencies.

Wow, I guess this was bound to happen, @Libra_ is being forked into OpenLibra, a permissionless version of Facebook’s blockchain, @geiger_lucas just announced at Devcon 🤯 — Camila Russo (@CamiRusso) October 9, 2019

Some members of the crypto community have already referred to the OpenLibra project as “hacking” Facebook or otherwise subverting the social media platform’s foray into digital currencies.

great presentation by @geiger_lucas on the open libra initiative — a. k. a. hacking facebook. pic.twitter.com/TFrqry9o5a — santi 👹 (@santisiri) October 9, 2019

However, Lucas Geiger, co-founder of crypto startup Wireline who first announced the project, says that OpenLibra will have less regulatory exposure than Facebook’s project and is being built with an emphasis on decentralization.

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