In Summary
- Worldcoin operations suspended countrywide.
- Investigations under to
The government has suspended the entire operations of Worldcoin program in the country.Interior CS Kithure Kindiki says the state has also suspended any other entity that may be similarly engaging Kenyans on the same.
Kindiki on Wednesday said that the government is concerned by the ongoing activities of an organization calling itself ‘Worldcoin’ which is involved in the registration of citizens through the collection of eyeball/iris data.
READ ALSO ICT Cs Owalo Defends Worldcoin Program Says Data Collection is Voluntary
“Relevant security, financial services and data protection agencies have commenced inquiries and investigations to establish the authenticity and legality of the aforesaid activities, the safety and protection of the data being harvested, and how the harvesters intend to use the data,” read the statement.
“Further, it will be critical that assurances of public safety and the integrity of the financial transactions involving such a large number of citizens be satisfactorily provided upfront.” It contuse.
Owalo Defense
Meanwhile Cabinet Secretary for ICT and Digital Economy, Eliud Owlao defended the Worldcoin project in the country saying the company American Artificial Intelligence (AI) company OpenAI was allowed to conduct its business in the country.
Owalo says Worldcoin, the new cryptocurrency project by American Artificial Intelligence (AI) company OpenAI, is legally in Kenya,is not breaching the Data Protection Act.
“This is something that started way back in April. We have a fully-fledged Data Commissioner’s office charged with the regulation of data security and privacy In April, the office of the Data Commissioner got wind of Worldcoin and wrote them a letter to clarify what they wanted to do,information available to the Data Commissioner is that within the existing legal frameworks is that there is no provision in the law that the organisation has breached. There has been correspondence with them,” Owalo stated.
According to the program,you register and have your irises scanned digitally with a device then participants are given 25 Worldcoin tokens to cash.They have to sell the tokens to cryptocurrency which loosely translate to KSH 7000.
