The metaverse and Web3 are all the rage, but the law is stuck at Web1

The metaverse and Web3 are all the rage, but the law is stuck at Web1
  • Home

  • Magazine

  • The metaverse and Web3 are all the rage,…

  • Legal Technology


    The metaverse and Web3 are all the rage, but the law is stuck at Web1





    Photo illustration by Sara Wadford/Shutterstock



    If a thief steals a CEO’s avatar and makes an inflammatory statement while impersonating the executive that tanks the company’s stock, that’s a crime in the metaverse.


    Or if a person sexually harasses another avatar in the metaverse, they could open themselves up to criminal or civil liability.


    Avatars can be held liable, but cases will be difficult to prosecute with existing laws, says Jesse Lake, an associate at the New York City office of Latham & Watkins.


    “Current laws have not been tailored to provide adequate recourse to the many transgressions that can occur in a virtual world,” says Lake, who wrote “Hey, You Stole My Avatar!: Virtual Reality and Its Risks to Identity Protection,” which was published in the Emory Law Journal in 2020.


    The metaverse, a colloquial term for a network of immersive 3D virtual worlds; and Web3, a new iteration of the internet that includes virtual reality, augmented reality, mixed reality, cryptocurrencies, non-fungible tokens and more, are evolving to become another Wild West technology frontier where existing laws are hard to apply, legal experts say.


    According to Lake, the problem is that the Communications Decency Act of 1996 has not been upd ..

    Support the originator by clicking the read the rest link below.