Bavaria's Data Protection Office Launches Probe Into Worldcoin's Iris-Scanning Data Practices
Bavaria’s State Office for Data Protection Supervision (DPS) has initiated an inquiry into the Worldcoin project and its data collection techniques, as disclosed in a Reuters report on Monday. This comes shortly after similar investigations by Kenya’s Office of the Data Protection Commissioner (ODPC) and France’s National Commission for Informatics and Liberty (CNIL), who also announced probes into the Worldcoin project for like-minded apprehensions.
Three International Jurisdictions Investigate Worldcoin’s Data Collection Methods
Various jurisdictions’ data regulators are diligently examining Worldcoin, a digital currency venture that utilizes iris-scanning biometric technology. The project’s native cryptocurrency, worldcoin (WLD), premiered last week. According to Openai CEO Sam Altman, a co-founder of Worldcoin, individuals signed up at a significant pace of every eight seconds on July 26, 2023. Nonetheless, by week’s end, France’s oversight agency, the National Commission on Informatics and Liberty (CNIL), raised concerns about Worldcoin’s data-gathering methods.
“The legality of this [data] collection seems questionable,” CNIL remarked to Reuters the previous week.
Subsequent to the French report, Kenya’s foremost data authority, the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner (ODPC), echoed similar misgivings about Worldcoin’s practices. Presently, Bavaria’s State Office for Data Protection Supervision (DPS) has joined the ranks of worried entities, declaring an investigation into Worldcoin as described in a Reuters article released on Monday. Bavaria’s DPS pointed out that it has examined Worldcoin since November 2022 due to its processing of “sensitive data at a very large scale.”
“These technologies are at first sight neither established nor well analysed for the specific core purpose of the processing in the field of transferring financial information,” Michael Will, the state regulator’s president, explained to Reuters through email correspondence.
The news organization contacted the Worldcoin Foundation but had not yet obtained a response regarding the issue. Upon reporting on the French data regulator, the Worldcoin Foundation claimed to have a “robust privacy program.” Moreover, the foundation indicated that it was cooperating with regulators in all jurisdictions, including Bavarian authorities. Currently, the Worldcoin project is operating 119 Orbs in 18 different countries around the world and has been expanding since it launched.
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