Last year, I told you about Sam Altman’s eyeball project. It sounded like a tech-bro experiment. Scan your iris, get some crypto, prove you’re human. Quirky, a little unsettling, easy to dismiss.
That was last year.
World, the company behind the chrome ball-shaped Orb, spent 12 months quietly embedding itself into your everyday life. And the irony has only gotten richer.
The same man who unleashed ChatGPT and AI on the world wants your biometric data to prove you survived it. Really.
🔭 The Orb is everywhere
Before you roll your eyes, let me break it down for you.
World launched in the U.S. in April 2025, opening in six cities with 7,500 Orbs planned worldwide and a new factory in Richardson, Texas, to make them. This year, they released the Orb Mini, a portable version designed so verified people can scan others. Think Uber but for eyeballs.
The business model is straightforward.
World scans your iris, converts it to encrypted numbers and issues you a World ID proving you’re human, not a bot. You get roughly 16 WLD crypto tokens for signing up. (More about that below.)
Then World charges apps every time they use your World ID to verify you.
- Tinder Japan uses it to confirm real people are the age they claim.
- Zoom launched a “Verified Human” badge for Orb-scanned meeting participants, because deepfake fraud cost businesses over $200 million in the first quarter of 2025. One engineering firm lost $25 million in a single fake video call. Yikes.
- Gap deployed Orbs in one San Francisco store.
- Docusign is integrating World ID for contract signing.
- Visa partnered to launch a World Card debit card, letting verified users spend crypto at over 150 million merchants.
⚠️ Here’s what they’re not leading with
The crypto token you get paid in? WLD launched near $1. It hit $12 at its peak. Today, it’s trading around 27 cents, and in March 2026, the World Foundation sold 239 million of its own tokens while the price crashed to a record low of 24 cents.
That’s insiders cashing out while regular folks hold the bag. Regulators aren’t charmed either. Spain, Germany, the Philippines, Colombia, Kenya, Hong Kong and Indonesia have all banned or formally investigated World for violating privacy laws.
Don’t you know hackers and country adversaries would love to get their hands on this database. I always hoped the government and hackers could split custody of my irises.
👁️ No eyes on me
I love innovation. But let’s not forget: The person who helped usher in the AI revolution has ambitions of becoming the gatekeeper for proving you’re human. That’s bold. It’s also a little unsettling.
When a World Orb grins up at you like a futuristic Poké Ball promising a couple of crypto coins in exchange for your retinal map, do not go gently into that biometric night.
Here’s the thing. You can cancel a stolen credit card. You cannot get new irises. Think before you blink.
📩 Send this to someone who would absolutely scan their eyeball for $4 in crypto without reading the terms.