Worldcoin is OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's attempt to corner the market for humanness verification by persuading enough mobile users to have their eyes scanned in exchange for cryptocurrency tokens.
Why Does Anyone Need to Prove Their Humanness?
One reason is the advancement in Altman's generative AI technology is making it more difficult to discern between bot-generated and human digital behavior. But don’t worry, he’s got an eyeball-scanning orb-plus-crypto-token to sell humanity on for that.
Now, any willing individual can acquire Worldcoin's “digital token” by selling their biometric data. This situation is rising in four European markets: The U.K., France, Germany, and Spain. This has further raised concerns of privacy regulators who are all set to investigate Worldcoin on what they are doing to their personal data.
In regards to this, the UK Information Commission Office has released a public statement, stating it will be making inquiries about the Worldcoin launch held earlier this week. “Organisations must conduct a Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA) before starting any processing that is likely to result in high risks, such as processing special category biometric data. Where they identify high risks that they cannot mitigate, they must consult the ICO,” they added.
In a further remark, the French administrative regulatory body for ensuring data privacy law, CNIL reviewed the issue. In its initial investigation, CNIL declared that it has selected its Bavarian counterpart as the leading organization in Europe to look into Worldcoin and that it supports their inquiry. However, Bavaria's data protection agency had no immediate response when contacted by AFP on Friday.
According to its website, Worldcoin intends to establish the "world's largest identity and financial public network" with its cryptocurrency and identification system.
Earlier this week, countering the allegations, Altman and co-founder Blania noted on Twitter that Worldcoin offers a "reliable solution for distinguishing humans from AI online while preserving privacy."
They added that Worldcoin, as a blockchain-based technology will help in improving economic opportunities and democratic processes.
While the most well-known blockchain, which powers the cryptocurrency Bitcoin, is infamous for being slow and expensive due to the requirement of enormous computer processing power to validate transactions as part of its system to reward processors with new bitcoins, Worldcoin can offer lower costs and faster data transfer while ensuring secure transactions.
