Metaverse World Warned by Interpol

The global police agency Interpol said it was preparing for the risk that online immersive environments - the "metaverse" - could create new types of cybercrime and allow existing crime to take place on a larger scale.

Madan Oberoi, Interpol's director for technology and innovation, told Reuters that Interpol's member countries have expressed concern about how to prepare for possible metaverse crime. ''Some crimes may be new to this medium, some of the existing crimes will be activated by the medium and taken to a new dimension.''

Oberoi said phishing and fraud can work differently when it comes to augmented reality and virtual reality. Child safety issues are also a concern, he said. Oberoi also said that virtual reality can also facilitate crimes in the physical world. ''If a terrorist organization wants to attack a physical space, it can use this space to plan, simulate and launch its exercises before the attack.''

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The Metaverse and Cybercrime Raises Concerns

Earlier this month, the European Union's law enforcement agency Europol said in a report that terrorist groups could in the future use virtual worlds for propaganda, recruitment and training. Users could also create virtual worlds with "extremist rules", the report said.

Europol said that if the metadata environment records users' interactions on the blockchain, "this could make it possible to track everything someone does based on a single interaction with them. It could provide valuable information for stalkers or extortionists."

The metaverse has become a tech fad in 2021, as companies and investors bet that virtual world environments will grow in popularity and mark a new phase in the development of the internet. To mark its shift towards this idea, Facebook announced in October 2021 that it was changing its name to Meta.

But so far, that vision shows little sign of materializing. Meta's share price fell on Thursday as investors expressed skepticism about spending on metaverse bets. Sales of blockchain-based assets representing virtual land and other digital properties have also fallen sharply after a period of frenetic growth last year.