Sam Altman’s Worldcoin meets Malaysian leaders on a cryptocurrency project aimed at strengthening government relations.

Leading proponent of iris scanning World Coin world

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The project’s Sam Altman and Alex Blania recently spoke with Malaysian leaders to demonstrate that they are committed to protecting users’ data and privacy while improving government relations.

Blania, CEO and co-founder of Tools of Humanity, the lead developer of the Worldcoin project, sat down with representatives of the Malaysian Digital Ministry on Tuesday. Article posted on X.

“We met with an impressive line-up of portfolio companies, including Nordstar and Worldcoin,” the Malaysian Digital Economy Corporation posted, also sharing photos of the meeting attended by Blania. I did.

Last Friday, Blania and fellow Tools for Humanity co-founder Altman jointly participated in a video call with Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim. government leader. plant reposted Ibrahim posted a message on Tuesday thanking Malaysian officials.

Worldcoin’s key public advocate meeting with Malaysian officials appears designed to show that the project takes concerns related to data collection and privacy seriously and is willing to work more closely with regulators and government officials. It followed a series of moves.

One of Worldcoin’s key premises is that by assigning digital identities to people, it will be easier to distinguish between AI-based actors and humans in the future.

Worldcoin’s Research History

Last month, Worldcoin suffered two temporary bans as Spain and Portugal ordered the project to stop collecting people’s personal data. Worldcoin gives people cryptocurrency in the form of WLD tokens when users scan their eyeballs to create their personal World ID. Speculation about scanning people’s irises and how Worldcoin manages biometric data has been one of the major concerns among privacy advocates.

Worldcoin problems in Spain and Portugal are not new. After the project began offering WLD tokens to new subscribers, many of whom were from the southern hemisphere, Worldcoin began receiving scrutiny from regulators in several countries, including Germany, France, Argentina, and Kenya. Early last month, South Korea also announced an investigation into the project’s collection of sensitive information.

A big reason why Worldcoin’s problems made headlines is because of Altman’s close ties to the project. Altman rose to prominence as CEO of OpenAI, which developed the high-profile AI platform ChatGPT.

Some people behind Worldcoin were surprised by how much government attention the project initially attracted and felt unprepared to handle the heightened attention and scrutiny, according to a person familiar with the matter. But top government officials remain interested in talks with WorldCoin amid growing curiosity and concerns about artificial intelligence, including threats like deepfakes, the official said.

Earlier this year, Tools for Humanity took steps to strengthen its government relationships, appointing former U.S. Ambassador to Austria Trevor Traina as director of global affairs.

“Policymakers naturally have many questions,” Traina said in a blog post announcing the decision. “As Worldcoin contributors, they expect us to ensure that the project safely carries out its mission, and it is our job at TFH to ensure that these expectations are met.”

new measures

In March, Worldcoin launched a new initiative, “Personal Custody,” which means that when you sign up for a new World ID, you will no longer be asked to store and encrypt your biometric data. At the time, Tiago Sada, head of product at Tools for Humanity, said the move would give people more “peace of mind.”

A few weeks later, the project revealed that people who sign up for World ID can ask Worldcoin to permanently delete the numeric “iris code” generated during an eye scan. The project also said it would take age verification more seriously to prevent people under 18 from signing up.

The measures were “developed in consultation with third-party privacy and security experts and based on preliminary assessments and questions raised by data protection authorities in some of the regions where WorldCoin is available,” the project said at the time. Yes.

According to the project website, Worldcoin has assigned more than 5 million World IDs.

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