Legal Hurdles in Metaverse An Analysis by Adv. P. M. Mishra, Finjuris Counsel FZ-LLC UAE

A new "metaverse strategy," according to Crown Prince Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, would contribute $4 billion to the city's GDP in five years and generate 40,000 new virtual employment.

In order to serve developers, content producers, and consumers of digital platforms in the metaverse community, the strategy places a strong emphasis on developing talent and investing in future capabilities.

The idea of the metaverse is not new and attempts to create one have been ongoing for years. For instance, the San Francisco-based company Linden Lab introduced Second Life in 2003. This online multimedia platform allows users to create avatars and to establish a "second life" in an online setting. Additionally, science fiction frequently anticipates and predates reality. The dystopian novel Snow Crash by author Neal Stephenson was released in 1992. It takes place in a "Metaverse" metropolitan setting with virtual homes that users may explore via VR goggles.

"However, the metaverse will bring up fresh and challenging legal challenges, just like every revolutionary technical advancement", says Adv. P. M. Mishra. The difficulties in law and regulation will expand and change alongside the actual uses of the metaverse as technology advances. The metaverse is created to be highly interwoven, seamless, and unanchored in physical location, further complicating an already intricate field of play. Practitioners will need to navigate questions of jurisdiction, territoriality, and conflicts of laws for each of the legal issues covered below; none of these issues have been satisfactorily resolved for the current internet, much less fully developed virtual worlds with an even higher level of interaction and user immersion.

Data Protection and Privacy Concerns: The most important legal concerns for platform owners will be those related to digital security and privacy. Tech businesses, which come under increased regulatory and public scrutiny, are familiar with these issues. But as technology becomes more pervasive in all facets of consumers' life, data in the metaverse will become exponentially more valuable than it now is. Existing rules will be put to the test by this emerging technology, and there will be more pressure on regulators to keep up with it. Furthermore, isolated, different metaverses won't need interoperability standards, but a single metaverse run by several companies would. The growth of the metaverse may prompt increased attention and action from antitrust authorities. Major technology corporations are already subject to major antitrust scrutiny and growing legislation throughout the world. Industry standards are necessary for interoperability between platforms, which is commonly regarded as a crucial element of the metaverse. Major technology corporations may face accusations of antitrust breaches and greater scrutiny from antitrust enforcers and legislators as they work to develop the metaverse's infrastructure.

Intellectual Property Rights May Be Infringed: Intellectual property issues are also quite important. For instance, when a particular work in the metaverse is the outcome of a decentralised collaborative process carried out by users who are anonymous behind avatars, it could be more challenging to ascertain who the producers are. Additionally, such ambiguity could alter how courts view fair usage. In the meanwhile, trademark attorneys are concentrating on issues like who should be held accountable when the identity of the infringement is ambiguous, how trademark dilution can occur in the metaverse, and whether digital assets should constitute as "goods" for purposes of the trademark rules. Fashion and luxury goods-related intellectual property challenges have already started to surface. Hermès, a French luxury fashion business, sued Mason Rothschild in January 2022 for marketing a line of digital goods dubbed "Metabirkins," which are digital replicas of Hermès's Birkin bag that retail for $10,000 or more, with values considerably higher on the secondary market. Hermès claimed that the usage of the Birkin name was misleading and a trademark violation.

Financial Technology: The metaverse will see an increase in legal fintech-related challenges, particularly as more businesses start selling digital goods and services. Cryptocurrencies and other digital assets are currently being used to purchase virtual items, and these sales may eventually be enabled by the same blockchain technology that enable the metaverse's fundamental interoperability features. Brands can offer identical products to numerous users (like branded pairs of sneakers) or rights or proofs of ownership to specific products, like a one-of-a-kind work of art, to distribute digital "goods" in the metaverse. Legal issues with appropriate ownership verification, possible infringement, and conversion of genuine and verified transactions will undoubtedly surface.

Regulation of Conduct: The legal bounds of conduct in a metaverse and who would enforce them are another crucial question. In a recent lawsuit, Roblox accused content creator Benjamin Robert Simon of engaging in a number of harassing behaviours against other users that violated both the Roblox terms of service and laws against computer malfeasance on the federal and state levels. A beta tester for Facebook's virtual reality platform Horizon World recently claimed that she had been virtually groped in the Plaza, a virtual gathering area in Horizon World. Facebook's response to this point has been to point out that users may block one another, but it hasn't addressed the possible legal repercussions of doing so, which may call for a creative use of rules intended to deal with wrongdoing in the real world.

In conclusion, the market for investing in the metaverse has never been more robust despite these obstacles. The promise of these technologies has been recognised by businesses, ranging from tech behemoths to clothing labels, and they have started to pursue novel client encounters. The metaverse's event horizon is only now being reached by mankind. Organizations and individuals will increasingly embrace the metaverse's use as we dive further into it and integrate this fundamental technology into their everyday lives. Legal counsel will need to assist their clients in navigating an increasing variety of legal and regulatory challenges as the metaverse develops and grows. Anticipating and addressing the legal and regulatory challenges the metaverse poses will be crucial to its effective acceptance by humanity, especially if it turns out to be the ultimate fusion of technology, content, and the human experience.

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