Tools for Humanity built a silver sphere to answer the internet’s suddenly urgent question: is anyone here actually human? Its real product is not the Orb, but a new trust layer stretching from irises to apps, blockchains and AI agents.
Kernel is a San Francisco startup building browser infrastructure for AI agents and web automations. Its cloud browsers launch in a few hundred milliseconds, persist login state across workflows, and evade bot detection, letting developers point agents at the live web without operating their own browser fleet. Backed by Accel and Y Combinator, Kernel raised $22M and says it is used by thousands of teams building agents, including Cash App and Rye.
World (formerly Worldcoin) is building a global "proof of human" network for the AI age. Created by Tools for Humanity and co-founded by OpenAI's Sam Altman and CEO Alex Blania, World lets people prove they are a real, unique human online without revealing who they are. Users verify with the Orb, a custom iris-scanning device, and receive a private World ID plus access to the World App, World Chain (an Ethereum Layer 2), and the WLD token. The pitch is simple: as AI makes bots indistinguishable from people, the internet needs a privacy-preserving way to tell humans apart from machines.