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Eyeball-scanning Worldcoin launches as AI hype converges with crypto

Snacks / Tuesday, July 25, 2023

Pondering my orb… Worldcoin, a crypto project designed to solve AI-induced identity problems, officially launched yesterday. Cofounded by OpenAI’s Sam Altman, Worldcoin says it establishes users’ “proof of personhood” (read: proof of being human) by scanning their irises with a metallic orb and associating the resulting data with a unique ID. When someone accuses a Worldcoin user of being ChatGPT, they could flash their World ID to show they're not a bot. Think: captcha 2.0. 

Coins for me… not for thee. Newly verified #realhumans are paid 25 WLD crypto tokens to sign up, and WLD briefly popped to over $3 yesterday after it was listed on crypto exchanges like Binance and OKX (before falling to about $2). But not everyone’s all in on WLD. Vitalik Buterin, the creator of ethereum, said Worldcoin’s design presents security, privacy, and centralization concerns. FYI: a fourth of WLD tokens have been earmarked for project insiders

Playing both sides makes it easier to win… Sam Altman’s Worldcoin offers a possible solution to a problem made worse by his ChatGPT: AI spam and scams. But tech solutions aren’t always a fix for human problems. Worldcoin has reportedly already spawned an illegal market for iris scans.

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