Singapore Police Investigates Worldcoin Account Sales: Deputy PM

Deputy Prime Minister Gan Kim Yong announced that Singapore police are investigating seven more individuals suspected of providing sales of Worldcoin accounts and tokens.

These seven individuals are allegedly violating the 2019 Payment Services (PS) Act, under which, ‘Worldcoin’ is not defined as a payment service.

Yong has asked users to stay alert if anyone offers to take over authority of their digital payment token wallets or World IDs as these accounts can be misused by malicious third parties.

Stressing over Worldcoin’s suspicious activities, Yong stated, “Organisations that handle such data, including biometric data, must ensure they put in place the necessary data protection and security arrangements to address the risks involved, when designing and operating their systems and processes.”

Deputy PM answered queries over the Worldcoin case in his response to the question raised by “Miss Rachel Ong in Order Paper, and Mr Derrick Goh’s filed for the sitting on or after 10 September”.

In August, Singapore Police Force had arrested five people(four men and one woman) for allegedly offering a service of buying or selling Worldcoin accounts and tokens.

Three suspects disguised themselves as recruiters on behalf of various third parties to recruit individuals and sign them up for Worldcoin accounts, before taking over the accounts and tokens in exchange for cash.

The other two suspects then took over these accounts and Worldcoin tokens and helped with the delivery of the Worldcoin accounts and Worldcoin tokens. During the investigation, more than 200 mobile phones were seized as evidence.

Since its launch in July 2023, Worldcoin has been hammered by several regulatory bodies for concerns over its use of biometric data and financial regulations.

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