Facebook Names Evan Cheng Director of Engineering, Blockchain

Evan Cheng has been appointed Director of Engineering, Blockchain at Facebook, continuing the social media service’s growing interest in the sector

The news comes on the heels of Facebook rescinding its previous ban on cryptocurrency touting via its advertising platform. Cheng is one of the most senior engineers at Facebook.

Cheng was head of Programming Languages and Runtimes at Facebook for the past three years. Prior to that, he was at Apple for a decade, rising to Senior Manager of Low-Level Tools.

Facebook faces a growing threat from decentralized social media, news and entertainment sites that will pay users for their data and attention spans, throwing the model of collecting data and selling advertising against that into flux.