The blockchain identity system, which aims to be used to differentiate humans from bots, already has two million sign-ups from its trial
In November 2022, Sam Altman’s company OpenAI broke the internet when it launched the powerful artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot, ChatGPT, for public use. It could produce human-like responses when prompted or asked a question. This quickly triggered a wave of questions about the possibilities of AI, including the types of jobs it could make redundant and if it could actually take over the world.
On Monday (July 24), Altman launched what seemed to be a solution to his creation: Worldcoin, a blockchain project centred around an identity system that provides “proof of personhood”—the idea of differentiating humans from bots.
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Announcing the news in a joint letter, Altman and project co-founder Alex Blania stated that Worldcoin is made up of two core parts: a “privacy-preserving” digital identity called World ID that only humans can get, and a digital currency that every person is entitled to receive “simply for being human”.
They posit that it will be essential in a world where powerful AI models are increasingly becoming available.
To get a WorldID, you must sign up to do an in-person iris scan using Worldcoin's “Orb”, a biometric verification device approximately the size of a bowling ball. Once the Orb verifies that you are a real human, it will create your WorldID.
Worldcoin is developed by Blania’s San Francisco and Berlin-based company, Tools for Humanity.
Worldcoin has reportedly reached 2 million signups from its beta period, and with Monday’s launch, it plans to ramp up its “orbing” operations and push out 1,500 orbs to 35 cities in 20 countries.
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To encourage sign-ups in certain countries, the company is enticing people with its cryptocurrency WLD. On crypto exchange Binance, the price of WLD has shot up from a starting price of $0.15 to $2.12 at press time, with a market cap of more than $220 million.
According to Worldcoin, if the project succeeds, it could “increase economic opportunity, scale a reliable solution for distinguishing humans from AI online while preserving privacy, enable global democratic processes, and show a potential path to AI-funded UBI (Universal Basic Income)”.
Since the launch, reactions from the crypto world have been mixed. Concerns have been raised about its actual ability to ensure privacy and security around the orb, as well as certain ethical issues surrounding how the company obtained its first batch of test users.
According to interviews conducted by MIT Technology Review with more than 30 individuals in six countries—including Indonesia, Kenya and Norway—who either worked for Worldcoin, had been scanned or were unsuccessfully recruited to participate in its initial user tests, the company’s representatives were found to have used “deceptive marketing practices” and “failed to obtain meaningful informed consent”.