Hong Kong’s privacy regulator, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data (PCPD), has ordered Worldcoin, a cryptocurrency project founded by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, to cease operations in the territory. The regulator accused Worldcoin of excessive and unnecessary privacy violations in collecting facial and iris scans following an exhaustive investigation.
The PCPD conducted 10 secret visits to Worldcoin's six locations in Hong Kong between December 2023 and January 2024 and found that they had scanned the faces and irises of more than 8,000 people. The agency pointed out that Sam Altman's company violated multiple regulations on the purpose and method of data collection.
For example, the PCPD highlighted that Worldcoin’s privacy notice and biometric data consent form were not available in Chinese. In addition, the agency accused the company’s employees of failing to adequately explain the documents or confirm whether participants understood them, resulting in insufficient informed consent from users.
Initially, Worldcoin wanted to retain the collected data for up to 10 years to be used to train artificial intelligence models for user verification. For the PCPD, this retention period was clearly unreasonable and excessive. The agency pointed out that there were "less privacy-invasive methods" to verify the identities of participants.
Following the PCPD’s enforcement notice, Worldcoin has removed all banners and logos from its offices in Hong Kong. The project claims that the personal data it collects is encrypted and secure. However, it has faced similar scrutiny in other countries, including Spain, Portugal and Kenya, regarding its biometric data collection practices.
In March, Worldcoin announced that it would stop collecting personal data and introduce a feature called “Personal Guardianship” that would allow users to store their data on their devices. Despite these efforts, the project has faced challenges in various jurisdictions.