Sam Altman's biometric cryptocurrency project, World Network, is causing concern among privacy advocates ahead of its launch in the US

Activists are wary of the system's data collection and protection methods, which use iris scans in exchange for cryptocurrency.

Sam Altman's biometric cryptocurrency project, World, is facing serious opposition from privacy campaigners in the U.S. ahead of its launch in the country.

The activists are concerned by the system's data collection and protection methods, which sees iris scans exchanged for cryptocurrency.

“Worldcoin is the opposite of privacy. It's a trap,” FactoryDAO CEO Nick Almond wrote on his X account.

The project, which is being billed as a defender of user privacy in an era of proliferating artificial intelligence, has already encountered numerous regulatory challenges around the world.

The use of iris scanning technology and the token payment scheme, formerly known as World, is now being investigated by authorities in India, South Korea, Italy, Colombia, Argentina, Portugal, Kenya, and Indonesia. Spain, Hong Kong, and Brazil have banned the project.

World's arrival in the U.S. could be the biggest test yet for CEO Sam Altman, as privacy concerns in the U.S. are further complicated by a complex regulatory landscape that differs from state to state.

Differences in privacy laws could leave World users vulnerable to discrimination

On April 30, Altman announced that World will operate in "key innovation centers" in six U.S. cities: Atlanta, Austin, Los Angeles, Miami, Nashville, and San Francisco.

Users will be able to scan their irises at these centers, providing World with unique biometric tokens. These markers can be used for verification when interacting with others on digital platforms.

But as World expands into the U.S., the uncertain regulatory landscape could scare people away and make it harder for the platform to gain user trust.

"There is no single federal law in the U.S. that specifically regulates biometric data (such as iris scans)," cybersecurity attorney Andrew Rossow explained.

Instead, the laws vary from state to state.

Two of the states in which World will operate - Texas and California - have some form of legal protection for biometric data. Users in the other three states - Georgia, Tennessee, and Florida - will have to rely on federal law, as there are no state-specific rules for iris scanning.

Even having a state law doesn't guarantee protection. There is no private right of action regarding biometric data in Texas - only the state attorney general can enforce the law on the capture or use of biometric identifiers.

"The effectiveness of user data protection, as applied to World, depends almost entirely on the Texas attorney general - their priorities, resources, and willingness to act," Rossow added.

A more aggressive attorney general can provide stronger protections, while "a less aggressive administration may lower enforcement priorities, leaving consumers vulnerable to information misuse."

The potential vulnerability of such protocols is one of the key factors driving activist efforts against systems like World.

Privacy International, a group backing a lawsuit in Kenya against World, says: "The absence of a robust legal framework and strong safeguards, biometric technologies pose a serious threat to privacy and personal security, as their identity can be expanded to facilitate discrimination, profiling, and mass surveillance."

Back in 2021, Amnesty International expressed concern about discrimination and the use of questionable methodologies in biometric systems.

Such systems, they said, can "infer and make predictions about things like people's gender, emotions, or other personal characteristics, while suffering from serious, fundamental flaws in their scientific underpinnings. This means that the conclusions they draw about us are often invalid, in some cases even embodying eugenic theories of phrenology and physiognomy."

Not everyone is convinced of the validity of privacy advocates' concerns.

Tomasz Stańczak, co-executive director of the Ethereum Foundation, said he spent "over 100 hours" analyzing World, which is being built on the Ethereum network.

He added that the project "looked very promising and much more secure and privacy-oriented than my intuition initially suggested."

Paul Dylan-Ennis, an Ethereum researcher and academic, said that he thinks World's technology is "probably strong in terms of privacy," but acknowledged that the aesthetics may put people off.

"There's just some sort of elusive 'Black Mirror' atmosphere to the whole thing," he stated.

World faces bans around the world

While World is hoping to attract users in America, other countries around the world are increasingly investigating, restricting, or banning the company.

In 2023, regulators in India, South Korea, Kenya, Germany, and Brazil began investigating the company's data collection practices. Spain became the first country to completely ban World's data collection in March 2024.

Spain's data protection agency said the decision was based on reports from Spanish citizens. It claimed that Orb operators provided "insufficient information, collected data from minors, and did not even allow for the withdrawal of consent."

Following the ban, World published a blog post claiming it was "operating legally in all countries where it is available."

However, global regulators disagreed. Hong