One look is enough - and you're a real person

Science fiction or reality? Project World, with which ChatGPT co-founder Sam Altman wants to revolutionize the Internet, is now really picking up speed. What once sounded like an experiment - verifying people by scanning their eyes - is becoming a global super app: sending money, paying, playing games, flirting - and all with just one digital identity, the World ID. Sounds like the future. Or maybe control after all?

Altman's idea is as simple as it is radical: because artificial intelligence is becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish from real people, an orb - a spherical scanner - uses iris recognition to ensure that you are not a machine. Only those who register in this way will have access to World - and soon also to tangible benefits such as free bank transfers, their own account number and even a Visa card for making payments.

Finance, games, dating - World is involved everywhere

What Meta needs in electricity with its AI data center, World needs in trust - and Altman is trying to earn this through practical functions. Particularly exciting: money transfers without fees will soon be possible via the app - a frontal attack on banks, fintechs and traditional payment services. In cooperation with Visa, a physical card will also be offered that is linked to the World account.

But that is by no means all:

• In collaboration with the gaming manufacturer Razer, World wants to eliminate gaming bots - so you supposedly only play with real people.
• In online dating in Japan, World is launching a pilot project with the Match Group (operator of Tinder & OkCupid) in which only verified users are allowed to participate.

The app is set to gradually grow into a super app, similar to WeChat in China - a tool that combines banking, messaging, shopping and more. This means that World is faster than Elon Musk, who is pursuing a similar vision with X, but has hardly delivered any results so far.

The question: freedom or total control?

What sounds like a security gain at first glance - "recognize real people, lock out machines" - raises huge questions. If logging in is only possible via an eye scan, anonymity on the internet will be gradually abolished. And who controls this sensitive data? World promises not to store iris information. But how can this be verified?

Its use is still voluntary. But what if online banking, dating or games only work with World ID in the future? Sam Altman's vision has a clear direction: a central, biometric identity for everything digital.

Anyone who sells their soul should at least be paid in cash

World may sound like progress, but the price is high: your eye as a password. The thought of a private company deciding at some point who is considered a "real person" - and who is not - is scarier than any science fiction movie.

Trust through technology? Perhaps. Control through technology? Definitely. For us, one thing is certain: anyone who has to verify that they are not a bot when dating online has not understood the real problem. And anyone who exchanges their biometric data for digital currency is selling more than just information - they are selling themselves.