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The Bavarian State Office for Data Protection (BayLDA), a German privacy watchdog, ordered Worldcoin to delete users’ biometric data. The company has appealed the decision.
This legal challenge targets the heart of the company’s operations in the European Union and may seriously hamper its developments in the region.
BayLDA Takes On Worldcoin
World (formerly Worldcoin) is a digital identity project gathering iris scans and other biometric data from millions of users. Today, the BayLDA published a press release summarizing its findings of an ongoing investigation into World, and it’s deeply unsatisfied with the firm’s compliance:
“The company will be obliged to provide a deletion procedure that complies with the provisions of the GDPR within one month of the decision taking effect. Worldcoin will be obliged to provide explicit consent… in the future. Moreover, the deletion of certain data records previously collected without a sufficient legal basis was ordered ex officio,” it stated.
World immediately appealed the BayLDA ruling and posted a response on its official blog. Essentially, the company claims that the investigation’s results “largely pertain to outdated operations and technologies that have been replaced in 2024.”
In other words, the firm claims to have improved its technology so much in the last year that the regulator’s concerns are invalid.
The last few months have been a difficult period for WLD’s price performance. The company rebranded from the “Worldcoin” name in mid-October, but the generalized bull market in November reached it late and receded fast.
Its WLD token rocketed 50% one week after the US election, but momentum quickly stalled out. However, the token’s future prospects remain shaky
German financial authorities have taken a harder approach to crypto in recent months. In July, the government sold its entire stockpile of Bitcoin, and regulators have since enacted a massive exchange crackdown. In other words, the BayLDA already acknowledged that World is appealing its decision and is unlikely to take the challenge lying down.
Still, this investigation began early in 2023 and is only publishing its findings today. Whatever legal challenge takes place between World and the BayLDA, the likeliest outcomes are difficult to predict at present.