Facebook's bitcoin-inspired cryptocurrency-GlobalCoin to launch in 2020

Facebook, the social media giant that owns WhatsApp and Instagram, is finalizing its plans to launch its own cryptocurrency next year.

Facebook wants to target the unbanked with GlobalCoin.

After months of speculation about when Facebook's rumored cryptocurrency will launch, newest reports suggest that it might be sooner than expected.

The US Treasury has also reportedly advised Facebook on how to deal with operational and regulatory issues regarding cryptocurrencies, including how to conduct the process of identity checks.

Nobody seems happy about Facebook's cryptocurrency.

In the letter, the committee questioned how Facebook's cryptocurrency would work and how the company will protect consumer data.

Blockchain expert David Gerard told BBC that launching GlobalCoin would enable Facebook to gain access to spending data that could be more valuable than the revenue from the cryptocurrency itself.

Back in February, Alex Stamos, the former chief security officer at Facebook, said that Facebook would be faced with extraordinary challenges when creating a cryptocurrency, which could spell disaster for the company.

If Facebook's GlobalCoin was to be a private stablecoin, its ties to an encrypted messaging service would make it a hotspot for money laundering.

If GlobalCoin doesn't implement advanced privacy features, having all that data in the hands of Facebook could be an unprecedented global privacy risk.