UAE minister's call for new “Metaverse” law alarms activists

Human rights activists express concern that the United Arab Emirates might start applying strict laws to netizens’ attitude across the “Metaverse”, thus restricting the freedom of speech throughout the virtual domain.

The concerns were raised after remarks by Omar Sultan al-Olama, the UAE's minister for artificial intelligence, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, during which he warned against "cyber-murders."

"If I come into the Metaverse and it's a realistic world that we're talking about in the future, and I actually murder you, and you see it... it actually takes you to a certain extreme where you need to enforce aggressively across the world because everyone agrees that certain things are unacceptable," he added.

The “Metaverse” represents a highly interactive three-dimensional virtual world, which has come to revolutionise the gaming and virtual reality industries among other domains.

The remarks prompted human rights campaigners to wonder whether Abu Dhabi was seeking to extend the control it asserts across the real world, including by criminalising dissent, to the virtual universe. 

Read more, visit MEE: https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/uae-plans-outlaw-cyber-murder-metaverse-condemned-activists-real-people