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Cardano backs Reef Data to monetize users' personal data via royalties
The EU Data Governance Act and Data Act provide a regulatory framework for the data intermediary model, with the Data Act effective September 2025.
The Cardano Foundation announced a partnership with Reef Data eG on July 28, positioning Reef as a data intermediary that pools members' personal information, licenses it to businesses, and pays royalties back to contributors. The arrangement is designed to keep the underlying data elsewhere, while Cardano's Reeve system records payment flows and royalty distributions at an accounting layer.
The initiative is linked to the EU Data Governance Act, which sets a regulatory backbone for recognized data intermediaries. The Act requires providers to register with national authorities and appear on a public list, and that list was updated on July 28 to name 36 providers across 10 countries, with Germany's only entry being Law and Innovation Technology GmbH, trading as Consenter.
Cardano's announcement places Reef in a broader category of European data intermediary models, including personal-information management systems, data cooperatives, data trusts, data unions, data marketplaces, and data-sharing pools. The wider landscape described in the announcement includes examples like Switzerland's MIDATA Cooperative and Swash, which reward users for permitted browsing activity.
Reef's workflow also references EU rules that govern data access and portability, including the right to access data under GDPR Article 15 and portability under GDPR Article 20. The partnership further points to the EU Data Act, which applies to data generated by connected products and takes effect in September 2025.