Sam Altman’s controversial identity verification project, Worldcoin, was launched yesterday. We now know how much someone earns if they agree to scan their iris to provide biometric data to the project. And that raises a few questions.
Iris scanning for cryptocurrencies
This is one of the major criticisms of the Worldcoin project, which is fuelling the controversy. Is it ethical to play on the lure of profit to recover the biometric data of many people? This week, ChatGPT creator Sam Altman’s project is both the object of covetousness and debate.
We now have an idea of the amount of Worldcoin to which people who scan their irises are entitled. According to analyst Ignas, one person received $62 in WLD after scanning his iris. This amount is bound to change, as the Worldcoin price is still very volatile. This morning, the token is trading at around $2, according to data collected by CoinGecko:
The WLD price is still very volatile after its launch
The total capitalization of WLD currently stands at $217 million.
The questions this raises
As several commentators have pointed out, while 62 dollars is a relatively modest sum in France and Western Europe in general, this is not necessarily the case elsewhere. In countries with very fragile economies, where inflation is rife, it can be a substantial sum. And this, according to Worldcoin’s detractors, can be problematic from an ethical point of view.
How can we ensure that financially fragile users scan their irises out of a genuine desire to participate in the project, and not simply out of a need to earn money? According to the Worldcoin whitepaper, users who have scanned their irises are located in a wide variety of regions:
Geographical distribution of users who have scanned their irises
As of yesterday, 63% of users who provided their biometric data were located in Africa and Asia. A total of 43 million WLDs will be distributed to users over the years. We know that Worldcoin’s managers have developed their project in Sudan and Indonesia, which has led to criticism: have they taken advantage of the poverty of the inhabitants of these countries?
One thing is certain: the debates surrounding Worldcoin are not about to stop. Sam Altman’s project – dystopian for some, revolutionary for others – should set a precedent when it comes to combining financial technologies with biometric data technologies.
