Rivalry Between Elon Musk and Sam Altman Unveiled as the latter excels in his project
Stepping Up: Sam Altman's World ID Project Joins Forces with Financial Service Giants
Get ready to send money for free using the World app, thanks to a new collaboration with Visa!
The innovative World ID project, which aims to distinguish real people from software on the internet through eye scans, is now venturing into the money transfer and financial services sector. Among other things, users will be able to send funds to loved ones at no cost via the World app. An account number will be provided for interactions with the banking system, and together with Visa, World will issue a payment card.
Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI and the creator of ChatGPT, is one of the brains behind the project. As AI development continues, it's becoming increasingly difficult to tell humans apart from software online. The verification system aims to ensure authentic human interactions. Users can create a profile (World ID) using an eye scan at World scanners called Orb. As an added bonus, users receive units of an in-house digital currency. After initial launches in Latin America, Europe, and Asia, World is now launching in the U.S.
Breaking Away from the Crowd
World is eyeing markets with a greater need for verification. There's a collaboration with gaming specialist Razer to guarantee human opponents instead of software bots. Another such area is online dating. Later this year, users of apps like Tinder and Okcupid in Japan will be able to log in with their World ID as part of a test program. World is partnering with dating platform operator Match Group for this initiative.
With these new features, World is inching closer to becoming a supersized app catering to all aspects of daily life. Apps like WeChat are popular, particularly in Asia. Elon Musk, founder of Twitter successor platform X, has long aimed to make X a universal app but has seen limited progress so far. Musk and Altman have been fierce rivals for years.
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Deeper Dive
Sam Altman's World ID project (formerly Worldcoin) is expanding its footprint in the U.S. and integrating financial services, a testament to these key developments:
- Widespread Expansion: The project aims to install 7,500 eye-scanning Orbs across six U.S. cities (Atlanta, Austin, Los Angeles, Miami, Nashville, San Francisco) by late 2025, covering approximately 180 million Americans.[4]
- Regulatory Shift: The project gained traction in the U.S. after the Trump administration adopted a crypto-friendly stance, a contrast from the Biden-era more reserved attitude.[3]
- Financial Moves: The World app now includes crypto-collateralized lending services, allows participation in decentralized prediction markets, and offers a Visa-branded debit card for spending WLD cryptocurrency.[4]
- Privacy and Regulatory Concerns: World faces investigations in Bavaria, Brazil, Kenya, and Spain over data privacy practices, with fines and deletion demands in some regions.[5] Altman insists that the Orb’s “proof of personhood” is crucial for long-term AI bot differentiation, despite public apprehension regarding biometric collection.[1][5]
The project's shift towards financial tools (loans, payments) positions it as both an identity verifier and a crypto-native banking alternative, utilizing its iris-scan database to combat AI-driven fraud.[2][4]
- Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI and creator of ChatGPT, is collaborating with financial service giants, including Visa, to expand the World ID project into the money transfer and financial services sector.
- World is partnering with Match Group, the operator of dating platforms like Tinder and OkCupid, to allow users to verify their identity using the World ID system on these apps.
- In an effort to stand out in crowded markets, World is collaborating with gaming specialist Razer to ensure that users interact with other humans instead of software bots in online gaming.
- The World app now offers crypto-collateralized lending services, participation in decentralized prediction markets, and a Visa-branded debit card for spending WLD cryptocurrency.
- World faces investigations and fines over data privacy concerns in various regions, as the project's "proof of personhood" system involves collecting biometric data through iris scans.
