Worldcoin’s WLD Surges 140% in a Week as Daily Users Hit 1M Milestone

The cryptocurrency associated with Worldcoin, a project co-founded by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, has seen a remarkable surge of over 140% within a week, coinciding with the milestone achievement of its wallet app reaching one million daily users.

In a statement dated February 18, Worldcoin revealed that its cryptocurrency wallet application, named “World App,” had surpassed the one million user mark, marking a substantial increase from just 100,000 active users per day in November 2023.

World App, the first wallet built for the Worldcoin project, passed 1M daily users this week. This community is incredible 🫡 pic.twitter.com/Mf6Y51gscQ

— Worldcoin (@worldcoin) February 17, 2024

Launched in July 2023 by Altman and Alex Blania, Worldcoin positions itself as a project focused on “privacy-preserving” digital identity verification. It rewards users with its native cryptocurrency in exchange for scanning their irises.

The price of Worldcoin (WLD) has surged more than 172% in the past two weeks. Source: CoinGecko

The primary objective of Worldcoin is to explore the implementation of a global Universal Basic Income by distributing a small portion of its native WLD token to every individual worldwide in exchange for identity verification.

However, the project’s ambition to introduce universal basic income alongside its biometric identity system has sparked controversy, particularly regarding privacy concerns surrounding its eye-scanning devices called “Orbs.”

On January 31, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data in Hong Kong initiated an investigation into Worldcoin’s local operations, citing “serious risks to personal data privacy.” This investigation involved warrants and inspections at six premises controlled by Worldcoin in Hong Kong.

Beyond Hong Kong, regulatory scrutiny has extended to various jurisdictions due to privacy concerns, resulting in the suspension of services in Kenya and the temporary halt of iris scans in India.

Despite regulatory challenges, the native WLD token has witnessed a remarkable increase of over 141% in value over the past week, benefiting from a broader upswing in the cryptocurrency market.

Worldcoin’s recent gains coincide with significant developments from OpenAI. On February 16, the organisation unveiled Sora, its new text-to-video generator, enabling users to create video clips and scenes from text inputs. Additionally, a week prior, Altman announced plans to raise an ambitious $7 trillion to support OpenAI’s semiconductor chip development efforts, a move that garnered attention across the tech industry.