The post Worldcoin’s less ‘dystopian,’ more cypherpunk rival: Billions Network appeared on BitcoinEthereumNews.com.

The idea behind Worldcoin (now called World) is an excellent one: without some way to verify human-based accounts, the internet will be completely overrun with AI bots. To a large extent, it already is: More than half of web traffic now comes from unidentified accounts, and Facebook and X are drowning in AI slop and pointless reply guys. More worryingly, hostile countries are using AI bots and content to divide the population of open and democratic societies. And if you are already worried about the UK’s mandatory digital ID plan, then World ID should also be on your radar. Apart from those creepy eyeball scanning Orbs, is it really a good idea to implement a global identity system co-founded by the CEO of the world’s largest private company, OpenAI? The project has raised significant privacy and ethical concerns, with Canadian public broadcaster CBC describing World’s aims as utopian but not without raising “dystopian fears.” Techmonitor and CoinDesk have both reported that critics of the project call it “Orwellian.” While these fears are somewhat overblown, there are genuine concerns with how World has been set up The project’s designers have attempted to counter those fears with strong privacy protections. The system doesn’t retain biometric data; instead, it uses zero-knowledge proofs to create a cryptographic hash that proves a user is unique without revealing who they are or tying that ID to a name and address.  One World ID: is it a feature, or a bug? World no doubt thinks of it as a feature, not a bug, but each verified human is issued a single World ID, which can be used to sign into other sites anonymously. Evin McMullen, co-founder and CEO of Billions Network. (Fenton) In theory, third parties cannot determine a user’s identity from their online activity, but critics…

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Filed under: News - @ October 10, 2025 4:28 am