World Foundation Raises $52.5M to Scale Sam Altman’s ‘Proof of Human’ ID

The World Foundation has raised $52.5 million in a token sale led by Pantera Capital to expand its World ID 'proof of human' network, with Bain Capital Crypto, Eightco Holdings, Selini Capital, and Susquehanna Crypto also participating. The funds will support bringing World ID to organizations, consumers, and AI agents as the need for verifying human identity grows amid AI development. World says 39 million people have joined its network and 18 million have been verified via its iris-scanning Orb.

In brief - The World Foundation, steward of Sam Altman's World, raised $52.5 million in a token sale led by Pantera Capital to expand its World ID "proof of human" network. - Bain Capital Crypto, Eightco Holdings, Selini Capital, and Susquehanna Crypto also joined; the WLD sold is locked for 12 months. - World says 39 million people have joined its network and 18 million have been verified in person via its iris-scanning Orb. The World Foundation has raised $52.5 million to expand World ID—the "proof of human" system from Sam Altman's World—betting that verifying who is human will only grow more critical as AI agents flood the internet, the nonprofit said Friday. The initial token sale was led by Pantera Capital and drew Bain Capital Crypto, Nasdaq-listed Eightco Holdings https://decrypt.co/338536/eightco-jumps-5000-worldcoin-treasury-bitmine-investment , Selini Capital, and Susquehanna Crypto, with all the WLD sold locked up for 12 months. The money will go toward bringing World ID to organizations, consumers, and their AI agents, the Foundation said. Pantera general partner Cosmo Jiang said the "need for Proof of Human is becoming acutely clear" as AI development accelerates. How World ID works World ID lets a person prove they are a unique human without revealing their identity, through a one-time iris scan at a spherical device called the Orb https://decrypt.co/150961/show-your-face-to-the-orb-eyes-on-with-sam-altmans-worldcoin that generates an ID stored on their phone. World, rebranded from Worldcoin https://www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/sam-altmans-rebranded-worldcoin-ramps-up-iris-scanning-crypto-project-2024-10-17/ in 2024, was co-founded by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman to build a global "proof of personhood" https://decrypt.co/resources/what-is-worldcoin-the-app-and-token-that-protects-your-personhood system. The technology is being integrated this year with platforms including Zoom, Docusign, Okta, Vercel, and Tinder, the Foundation said, alongside a new enterprise-ready release, World ID 4.0 https://world.org/blog/announcements/world-id-full-stack-proof-of-human , that lets outside developers build their own credentials into the system. The raise coincides with the project's third anniversary. More than 39 million people have joined the network, 18 million have been verified by an Orb, and World has processed 475 million ID proofs, the Foundation said. Scrutiny and appetite World's iris-scanning model has drawn regulatory pushback across multiple countries over its handling of biometric data. Hong Kong ordered it to cease operations https://decrypt.co/231913/hong-kong-just-kicked-out-worldcoin-over-privacy-concerns in 2024; a Kenyan court ordered it to delete https://decrypt.co/318029/kenyan-court-orders-sam-altmans-crypto-project-delete-biometric-user-data users' biometric data; and Brazil banned it https://decrypt.co/305639/brazilian-regulator-denies-worldcoin-appeal-ban from paying people for iris scans. Spain moved to halt its data collection https://www.reuters.com/markets/currencies/spanish-watchdog-tells-worldcoin-delete-all-iris-scan-data-2024-12-19/ , and South Korea fined the project $830,000 https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20240926005500315 for privacy violations. Institutional interest has grown regardless. Eightco, one of Friday's investors, built the first corporate WLD treasury https://decrypt.co/338536/eightco-jumps-5000-worldcoin-treasury-bitmine-investment last year, and Grayscale this week filed for the first U.S. ETF https://decrypt.co/373913/worldcoins-wld-jumps-8-on-grayscale-etf-filing tied to the token.