Facebook is currently working on creating its cryptocurrency. It is something the social media network began researching about a year ago. Until recently, the corporate development team of Facebook, Morgan Beller, as the sole employee exploring Facebook said that Facebook could also use cryptocurrency.

Last week, Facebook announced that David Marcus, the Vice President and in charge of Messenger, will head up and create a new team of about a dozen that will explore how the platform can best leverage Blockchain. The development will be part of the mission of the new team which is planned to create headed by Marcus. David Marcus is the previous president of Paypal, a member of the board for cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase and an early Bitcoin investor.

The said plan of the Facebook is expected to take years to develop possibly. The company is not planning to hold an initial coin offering, where public users can purchase limited numbers of cryptocurrency. Facebook could also acquire cryptocurrency companies and an existing Blockchain. Facebook is a bit late for the game in exploring its potential in leveraging the Blockchain technology.

In March, it was reported that Google is also developing a Blockchain-based technology. The action done by Google aims to support its cloud businesses, which also allow the third parties to verify and post transactions. Google may also offer a white-label version for other companies to function on their servers. Moreover, Rakuten is also planning to develop a cryptocurrency for its loyalty program – pointing the potential support transactional-based digital companies.

Facebook could also allow its users to use the virtual currency to make new payments. It could also support more secure transactions, which will be important as most of its competitor platforms become more transactional. Its aim to develop its cryptocurrency is one of the efforts by Facebook to improve privacy and security on the platform.

The social media platform is slowly proceeding with the cryptocurrency to make sense, given that this particular area of Blockchain has some challenges. Last February, David Marcus told CNBC that Messenger is unlikely to support cryptocurrencies anytime soon because as a payment technology, they are slow and expensive.

Facebook also banned ads from promoting cryptocurrencies on its platform. Facebook aims to fight “crypto jacking” and the fraudulent mining of the cryptocurrency, which also remains to be one of the major challenges with the digital currency.