Worldcoin’s latest hardware, the Orb Mini, designed to facilitate portable human verification, has sparked widespread ridicule on Crypto Twitter. Launched with the tagline “It goes where you go,” the device has instead triggered comparisons to dystopian scenarios and received mockery for its ambiguous use case. Alicia Katz from decentralized finance (DeFi) lending platform Euler Finance pointed out, “The thing about humans is they can tell when a human is in front of them. When something is slightly off, they can experience the uncanny valley, an uncomfortable feeling similar to when your date tries to scan your eyeball.” Another user humorously questioned, “Is this so you can register your friends?” likening the device to a sci-fi prop rather than a serious identity solution. The Orb Mini is a portable iris-scanning device that generates a unique World ID for users stored on the blockchain. Resembling a smartphone with visible eye sensors, it is a compact version of Worldcoin’s original Orb. Unveiled at the “At Last” event in San Francisco, the device is part of a broader initiative by Tools for Humanity, planning to distribute 7,500 Orb units across the US by year-end. Several prominent voices in the crypto community have raised concerns about the Orb Mini’s security, ethics, and practicality, with questions about its real-life problem-solving capabilities and vulnerability to spoofing. Critics have also highlighted the device’s social implications, with Swan Bitcoin CEO Cory Klippsten calling it a “creepy dystopia-shilling” tool that reflects the creators’ insecurities rather than addressing trust issues. Worldcoin’s efforts to mainstream biometric identity tools face resistance, especially as privacy advocates question decentralization, surveillance, and bodily autonomy. The company, supported by Sam Altman’s Tools for Humanity, encountered challenges in Indonesia as local regulators temporarily suspended its registration certificates. Global regulators have pushed back on World’s operations since its launch, with governments like Germany, Kenya, and Brazil expressing concerns about the security risks associated with users’ biometric data.