Switzerland is reportedly the fastest-growing tech country in Europe. This may be part of the reason that Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook chose the country’s data protection agency, the Swiss Federal Data Protection and Information Commission (FDPIC), to oversee its Libra stablecoin data privacy protection. The FDPIC may have denied that assertion previously, but it’s now time for U.S. regulators to better understand what’s going on. A group of politicians on Capitol Hill is going to take a journey to Switzerland to talk about cryptocurrency and Libra.
According to the Swiss news outlet NZZ am Sonntag, six members of the House Financial Services Committee (HSFC) are going to meet with FDPIC Commissioner Adrian Lobsiger to discuss digital currencies, as well as Facebook’s project. Heading up the U.S. delegation is Maxine Waters, the chair of the HFSC, an outspoken critic of Libra.
Waters, as well as other U.S. lawmakers, have often called out the small European country as a haven for money-laundering activity. Waters wants to better understand the relationship between Facebook and Switzerland and will visit the country personally to try to figure things out.
The politician apparently wants to look in Lobsiger’s eyes to determine whether or not the FDPIC has been secretly negotiating with Facebook. The commission has publicly spoken out against any relationship and has reportedly gone after Facebook to clarify its assertion that it is working with the commission, stating that Lobsiger had sent a letter to the social media giant asking for clarification. Hugo Wyler, the head of communication for the FDPIC, explains, “[Lobsiger] had not received any indication [from Facebook] on what personal data may be processed [and] the Libra Association should inform him of the current status of the project so that he could assess the extent to which his advisory competences and supervisory powers would apply.”
The fact that the delegation is taking time out of its schedule to visit Switzerland in order to talk about Libra seems to show that there is still some interest in allowing the project to proceed, and that it could still be under serious consideration. Either that, or the lawmakers just wanted some of the country’s edible gold chocolate or to visit the Swiss Alps.
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