• Worldcoin is designed to become the world's largest human identity and financial network by giving every person on the planet a unique identity.
• Users are given a digital passport that lets them prove they are a unique and real person distinct from bots while remaining anonymous.
Image: SCREENGRAB
A new cryptocurrency craze named Worldcoin has hit Kenya and spread like wildfire if the number of people who showed up for registration before its suspension is anything to go by.
The government cited data security concerns as the reason behind the suspension.
Basically, Worldcoin is designed to become the world's largest human identity and financial network by giving every person on the planet a unique identity, based on what it calls “proof of personhood”.
The unique ID, it says, is a digital passport that lets you prove you are a unique and real person distinct from bots while remaining anonymous in an era where Artificial Intelligence is taking centre stage.
The company argues that with advances in artificial intelligence, it has become increasingly difficult to tell whether online activities - written or visual - are from humans or AI.
Worldcoin, it says, seeks to solve this confusion by deploying the digital passport.
It enables seamless sign-in to websites, mobile apps and crypto apps without sharing personal data like names and emails.
On registration, users must provide their phone number and have their unique personhood verified using Orb, a biometric imaging device that verifies an individual's unique personhood by scanning their iris.
Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, is a co-founder and the brains behind the ambitious blockchain-based global verification system.
Altman is better known for creating ChatGPT, an AI tool which has ironically worsened the very problem that Worldcoin is trying to solve.
The project has come under criticism mainly over its dubious methods of recruiting users.
Some critics have accused it of targeting poor nations to onboard and grow subscriptions.
In Kenya for incidence, subscribers were receiving Sh7,000 upon scanning their iris using a device called Orb which earned them 25 free tokens exchanged for $2 (Sh285).
It takes three reinforcing components for the Worldcoin to work -World ID, World App and WLD cryptocurrency token.
World ID
This enables users to verify their 'humanness'. It's the unique identity created after users scan their iris on the Orb device which eventually generates an IrisCode.
The code does not contain a user's personal information but purposely prevents the creation of more than one World ID. Think of the World ID as a Sim card.
Since no two people have the same iris pattern and these patterns are very hard to fake, the Orb can accurately tell people apart from one another.
After creation, the World ID is uploaded on the Worldcoin blockchain.
World App
After obtaining the World ID, users then download the World App, a central location which basically functions as a crypto wallet, the equivalent of a M'pesa account.
This is where user credentials are stored and where the users can verify themselves to access Worldcoin.
WLD cryptocurrency token
After creating the World ID and downloading the World App, users can now access the cryptocurrency token.
The company said everyone who has verified their uniqueness may claim free WLD tokens in their World App.
To receive all of their free Worldcoin tokens, verified users will need to reopen the World App periodically in the weeks following their World ID verification.
Eligible verified users can claim 1 free WLD token per week with no maximum.
Each time a verified user opens the World App during those first several weeks, they will be prompted to secure a portion of their free Worldcoin tokens.
Users can also buy Worldcoin tokens.
Thinks of Worldcoin tokens as bonga points which you can use to pay for certain actions in the World App.
Besides tipping artists, and buying and selling goods and services, some users may also use WLD tokens as a store of value.
Worldcoin said it has created 10 billion WLD which will be issued over the course of 15 years.
The company said 143 million WLD are in circulation since the official launch in May 2021.
Some 100 million of the tokens were sent to market makers to facilitate trading.
Worldcoin, however, did not give guarantees about how much WLD will be worth.
"Similar to other digital assets, the value of the Worldcoin token may change - even significantly - up or down," the company states on its website.