TL;DR
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The state-owned China Mobile has proposed to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) to create a digital ID for all metaverse and online virtual world users.
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The metaverse focus group will meet again in October, when the proposals can be voted on.
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If passed, this proposal could have a major impact on telecom and technology companies around the world, as the ITU’s metaverse group is responsible for developing new standards for metaverse services.
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In … of today:
“Your conspiracy-obsessed cousin who still lives at home may have been right when he said George Orwell’s ‘1984’ was not a story – but one warning” news…
China Mobile (the telecom company owned by the CCP) brought a great idea to the United Nations International Telecommunication Union (ITU) early last month.
The pitch is essentially:
“What if we imposed a digital ID on all metaverse users?
Where participants would be given a digital identity based on ‘natural characteristics’ (how they look) and ‘social characteristics’ (what they do).
Oh, and um… this information would be forever shared with law enforcement. You know, to maintain order in this new virtual world.”
…say it with us now: YIKES!
China’s attempt to promote a government-controlled version of the Internet and telecommunications systems is not new.
But when you see this, it becomes pretty obvious that the CCP is trying to embed its social credit system into the metaverse before it’s even begun.
Good news is: this is just a proposal for now.
Bad news is: the proposal could be put to the vote as early as October, the next meeting of the group.
The really scary part is: if passed, such a proposal could affect telecom and technology companies worldwide as the aim of the ITU is to develop new global standards for metaverse services.
Aside from the obvious draconian level of surveillance from 1984, a government-controlled internet just seems boring.
We vote to keep the internet weird.