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Worldcoin plans to relaunch in India in 2024 after silently pulling the plug 3-4 months ago. The project has also courted controversy in Kenya and Germany and seems to be competing with its co-founder Sam Altman’s artificial intelligence (AI) ambitions.
The controversial eye-scanning project, Worldcoin, will relaunch in India in 2024 amid concerns about its premise to create a database of global identities. The company claims its ambitions in India were limited in scope.
Indians Crowd Worldcoin Kiosks
Tools for Humanity (TFH), the company behind Worldcoin, said it halted its Indian operations until it could safely process surging demand. One mall executive in Bengaluru said police sometimes had to control crowds eager to see how Worldcoin’s Orb worked. Those who sign up for a WorldID and have their irises scanned by the device can receive 25 WLD tokens.
Some critics have branded Worldcoin’s data collection exercises as a “dystopian nightmare.” Regulators in the UK launched an investigation into the project earlier this year, while authorities in Kenya have banned the project altogether.
Worldcoin wants to prove a person’s humanity amid rapid advancements toward so-called superintelligent AI. The project’s co-founder, Sam Altman, is in charge of OpenAI, which catapulted AI into the mainstream about a year ago.
Read more: What Is Worldcoin? A Guide to the Iris-Scanning Crypto Project
Worldcoin Prospects Beyond India in 2024
Worldcoin’s success hinges on its ability to convince people of the danger of increasingly powerful AI. Its progress in 2024 will depend partly on its ability to reassure skeptics and how fast AI progresses.
Right now, it is hard to see people in affluent countries buying into Worldcoin’s thesis. The project has been observed to target vulnerable populations.
So far, sign-ups total 2.8 million, a mere 0.04% of the 8 billion originally targeted by Worldcoin. Concerns about privacy abound since a hack could result in an unprecedented compromise of sensitive personal data.
The project may also struggle to reach critical mass given its relatively slow uptake compared with other successful projects. It may need help from the progress of ChatGPT, whose abilities rapidly gained popularity with individuals and corporations alike this year. Earlier this year, billionaire Elon Musk controversially predicted that AI could take over all human jobs.
Read more: Will AI Replace Humans?