GoKawiilA Sam Altman-backed technology that many governments rejected is finding traction in the American corporate world.
On April 17, World, a project designed to distinguish humans from bots using biometrics, announced strategic partnerships with Tinder, Zoom, and Docusign. The three companies will use World’s digital identification to verify users, aiming to reduce deepfakes, scams, and other fraudulent activity.
The World project was launched by Tools for Humanity, a startup co-founded by Altman. The company scans people’s irises and assigns them a “proof of humanity.”
In 2023, World installed several Orbs — physical, spherical biometric imaging devices that scan a person’s iris — in various cities across the globe. They asked people to scan their irises and create an ID, at times offering a sign-up bonus of $50 in cryptocurrency to encourage registrations. The cash-for-data plan, however, did not go down too well.
In the last three years, several governments in Asia and Africa have halted World’s operations due to concerns about the collection of biometric information from their citizens and the violation of privacy laws. Parts of Europe have banned it outright and called for the deletion of logged data. In Latin America, sign-ups are on pause, with several probes underway.
Surveillance whistleblower Edward Snowden has criticized World — which was called Worldcoin until October 2024 — for “cataloguing eyeballs.”
The company, which claims to have verified more than 18 million people across 160 countries, continues to expand worldwide. It’s been currying favor by releasing studies about support from citizens in Portugal, Spain, and South Korea. On April 16, it published a blueprint for how companies can grow their revenue with its digital ID. Meanwhile, the global backlash has persisted.
In April 2025, the company had set up with 7,000 orbs across six cities in the U.S. Many of these continue to operate as legal safeguards about biometric data collection, and cryptocurrencies are less strict and uniform across American states than in the European Union.
Here is a timeline of World’s troubles around the globe:
October 2021: Co-founders Alex Blania and Sam Altman announce Worldcoin, conceived as a digital identity system linked to a cryptocurrency-based financial network. They reveal a new device called the Orb, which can scan the irises of around 700 new people per week. It says it plans to produce more than 50,000 devices per year.
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