Legal Issues Inside the Unnatural World of Metaverse

Abstract

Metaverse is positioned to be a new world where life, including commerce, befalls in a drastically different manner: virtually instead of physically. The concept of a virtual world is not a new idea, its recent revitalization stems from new blockchain technology which enables its development. Resting on top of such technology, metaverse is seemingly poised to alter commerce along with multiple other human interactions, predictably, legal issues will mature alongside these developments. The objective of this article is to merely introduce the principal legal issues most likely to be created or intensified by the eventual, complete development of metaverse. The principal issues include: (1) privacy and data collection and use; (2) privacy and artificial intelligence (AI); (3) the legal standing of cryptocurrency; and (4) the more distant but likely development of a new ‘natural law’. metaverse, privacy, data collection, data use, artificial intelligence, natural law, blockchain technology, cryptocurrency