World Foundation raises $52.5M to expand World ID as AI verification demand grows

World Foundation raised $52.5 million through a sale of locked WLD tokens to strategic investors, the nonprofit steward of Sam Altman's World protocol said Friday, as demand for human verification tools grows alongside the proliferation of AI-generated content online.

Pantera Capital led the funding round, with Bain Capital Crypto, Eightco Holdings, Selini Capital and Susquehanna Crypto also participating, according to a statement shared with Cointelegraph. All WLD tokens sold in the raise are subject to a 12-month lockup.

"The need for Proof of Human is becoming acutely clear with the acceleration of AI development," Cosmo Jiang, general partner at Pantera Capital, said in the statement.

The funds will go toward expanding World ID, a biometric identity system that uses a spherical device called the Orb to scan a person's iris and generate a unique digital credential stored on their phone. The system lets users prove they are a unique human without revealing their identity. World, rebranded from Worldcoin in 2024, was co-founded by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman to build a global proof-of-personhood layer for the internet.

More than 39 million people have joined the World Network, with 18 million verified in person via an Orb and 475 million World ID proofs processed since launch, the foundation said. The technology is being integrated this year with platforms including Zoom, Docusign, Okta, Vercel and Tinder, alongside a new enterprise release, World ID 4.0, that lets outside developers build their own credentials into the system.

The raise coincides with the project's third anniversary and marks a shift from building the network to scaling its utility, World said. WLD traded at roughly $0.37 with a market capitalization of just over $1.3 billion, according to CoinGecko data.

World's iris-scanning model has drawn regulatory pushback across multiple jurisdictions. Hong Kong ordered it to cease operations in 2024, a Kenyan court ordered it to delete users' biometric data, and Brazil banned the project from paying people for iris scans. Spain moved to halt its data collection, and South Korea fined the project $830,000 for privacy violations.

Institutional interest has continued to grow despite the scrutiny. Eightco Holdings, one of Friday's investors, built the first corporate WLD treasury last year, and Grayscale filed for the first US exchange-traded fund tied to the token this week. The World Network previously raised $135 million in a private token sale to a16z and Bain Capital Crypto in May 2025.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.