Kenya’s Biometric Privacy Concerns Resurface Amid ChatGPT Selfie Trend
Kenyan citizens are voluntarily submitting biometric data to OpenAI's ChatGPT platform, weeks after Worldcoin—a crypto-backed digital identity project co-founded by Sam Altman—deleted iris scans collected in the country. The viral trend involves users uploading selfies to generate AI caricatures, raising alarms from Data Commissioner Immaculate Kassait about uncompensated data training for corporate AI models.
Worldcoin had previously drawn regulatory scrutiny in Kenya for offering 25 free tokens (worth ~Ksh 8,256) in exchange for iris scans via spherical 'orb' devices. The government suspended operations in August 2023 over data misuse concerns, creating a paradoxical landscape where citizens now freely supply similar data to ChatGPT without monetary incentives.