Brazil prohibits paying money to record the Iris data of its citizens

The Brazil Government has forbidden to pay money in exchange for the data registration of the iris of citizens, to a preventive extent that enters into force this Saturday and affects the activities of the Tools for Humanity company.

The National Data Protection Authority considers that the existence of a financial consideration can “harm” the obtaining of the “consent” of the holder and “interfere” in the “free demonstration” of his will, he reported in a statement.

According to the agency, The payment of money can influence the decision of individuals, Especially those in vulnerability situation, to make available their biometric data.

According to the law, consent for this has to be “free, informed, unequivocal and supplied for specific purposes.”

The agency opened the investigation last November to analyze the processing of the data, which is intended to build a kind of digital identification that verifies that the holder is a human being and not an artificial intelligence tool.

Tools for Humanity opened several registration points of the IRIS in the city of São Paulo and promised the payment of some 600 reais in cryptocurrencies (about 100 dollars or 95 euros)which raised the interest of thousands of people, according to Brazilian media.

Other countries, such as Spain, have also prohibited the collection of these data from doubts about their use by the companies involved.

Tools for Humanity, based in Germany and the US, was founded by entrepreneurs Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAi, and Alex Blania.