Sam Altman’s Worldcoin Takes Aim at Asia as EU Regulatory Challenges Build Up

Key Takeaways

• Worldcoin’s managing director of Europe said the company will be shifting its focus towards Asia.
• The crypto startup is facing mounting regulatory hurdles in both Europe and Asia.
• The project is reportedly in talks to integrate its technology into the products of some “very prominent game publishers” in Asia.

Worldcoin, Sam Altman’s crypto biometrics startup, is looking to channel its focus into Asia and away from Europe as regulatory hurdles build up against the project.

Fabian Bodensteiner, Worldcoin’s managing director of its Europe arm, said the company needed to prioritize its focus on countries that were receptive to its mission.

Moving Away From Europe

Talking at Sifted Summit  this week, Bodensteiner explained that the company would be moving away from Europe even though it is where most of its products are built.

“We just see a larger dynamic in other regions of the world, and because we’re not 1000 employees, we need to prioritize where we see the biggest business opportunities,” Bodensteiner said.

OpenAI CEO Altman made headlines when he co-founded Worldcoin in 2023.

The project’s idea is to use biometric data from eye scans to provide every person on the planet with a “World ID,” a verification that proves they are human beings.

However, the project has yet to be a runaway success, as critics have raised concerns over the ethical implications of collecting sensitive biometric data like iris scans.

Europe’s Critics on Worldcoin

Worldcoin’s technology and products are built by Tools For Humanity, which has headquarters in San Francisco and Erlangen, in Germany.

Bavaria’s data protection authority is expected to make a decision on the future of the project after a two-year-long audit of Tools for Humanity. The decision could heavily impact the company’s European operations.

Authorities are also cracking down on the project elsewhere in Europe. In March, Portugal suspended Worldcoin  for 90 days following data privacy concerns.

The Spanish Agency for the Protection of Data followed suit in June , ordering the company to stop collecting data in the country and a suspension of 90 days.

The UK also launched a probe  into the startup following its debut in London last July.

However, in a comment to CCN, Worldcoin Foundation said it was committed to making ‘proof of human’ technology available to everyone in the world, including Europe.

“The project has deep and rich origins within Germany and remains committed to the European market as evidenced by recent launches in Austria and Poland and upcoming EU launches in the coming months,” Worldcoin said.

Adding: “As AI advances and it becomes increasingly important to distinguish between human and synthetic interactions online, the need for technology that proves humanness has never been more apparent.”

Asia Has Challenges, Too

With regulatory hurdles building up across Europe, Worldcoin is looking to see some success with a hopefully receptive Asian market.

However, despite Bodensteiner’s optimism, Asian countries have also been launching probes of their own on the project.

List of APAC Countries Investigating Worldcoin

Worldcoin announced in September  that it was not under investigation by Singapore’s government, following previous reports that authorities were probing the project.

The announcement came just days after Singaporean authorities  said they were investigating bad actors linked to the platform for potential money laundering.

Despite the ongoing regulatory chaos, Bodensteiner said the company remains committed to Asia. The company is currently in talks with “very prominent game publishers” to integrate Worldcoin’s tech into their products in the region.

As for Europe, Bodensteiner said the company wants to make it work, “we don’t just want to leave Europe and dodge things.”

“We want to stay in the conversation, and we want to stay committed to the market.”