Challenges

Web 3.0 and the metaverse are still very incipient and there are several challenges for any participants and business operators that wish to experience longevity of purpose in this new frontier market sector.

When it comes to the facilitation of payments, digital, cryptocurrency or otherwise, in order to be successful long term, issues in regard to data privacy, payment fraud, regulation and compliance must be considered absolute critical path items.

The shift to Web 3.0 and the metaverse is in progress. While there’s still much left to determine, the transition figures to be one of the most seismic shifts in how we interact with the internet since its inception. A more immersive, interconnected norm will likely replace how we interact with disparate accounts, devices, and platforms today.

As companies think about this transition, one high-priority agenda item will be to fortify revenue streams. Users and metaverse inhabitants will want to buy items and services in the metaverse, and companies will want to provide that for them. Secure, seamless payments are vital to this next evolution of the internet, but this means a fundamental rethinking of how that occurs today. What works for a point-of-sale transaction in today’s internet doesn’t necessarily translate to tomorrow's.

Blockchain and distributed ledger technology have already become highly fragmented in terms of platforms, standards, and offerings. As a result, companies have been unable to find an off-the-shelf, complete packaged blockchain solution.

And while cryptocurrencies and blockchain aim to solve most challenges, there are a few glaring and pervasive issues that still arise when it comes to its implementation.

Lack of interoperability, governance, and integration models prevent pervasive blockchain deployment and cryptocurrency access across financial service ecosystems.

Further, aside from “accountability, reliability, transparency, compliance, security, verifiability, auditability, acceptance of liability”, people require motivation, incentives and returns in order to remain loyal and connected. Most offerings are fragmented and costly in terms of products, features, functions or even benefits.

Hybrid developments with cryptocurrencies and blockchain often add complexity making it much harder to identify appropriate use cases. Current platform offerings to date that promise results remain challenged as widespread adoption continues to be their barrier.

Security

Next big challenge for payment facilitation in the metaverse: security. And these are more tightly woven concepts than you might think, as it might be easy to sacrifice one for the sake of the other.

Crafty operators will always find ways to breach weak security postures. As a recent example, a hacker breached the account of a community manager of a popular NFT project, which enabled a broader phishing attack on members of a Discord server. Hundreds of thousands of dollars of Ethereum and the NFTs themselves were stolen in the attack.

This problem also extends to many unsecured or under secured networks, which hackers can gain entry to and steal information. These are particularly problematic concerns for the metaverse, as gaining access to one account could conceivably cause a good deal of financial and reputation damage.

Cybersecurity is a perpetual game of playing catch-up. There will always be vulnerabilities, exploits and patches to keep up with. As users place more trust in an immersive experience, organizations must do their part to put customer security first.

Regulation

It’s still the wild west out there for the metaverse, and more specifically the cryptocurrencies that will be prominent within it. Governments generally want these transactions to be safe, secure, and legal — but historically, this hasn’t been the case. If someone wants to make an illegal dark web transaction, there’s little stopping them, as it’s easy to mask your identity with digital wallets.

Without a framework in place for how to reliably handle, manage and secure cryptocurrency as a payment method at scale, to date it has seemed like a tall task for companies to truly embrace these decentralized currencies. Even if they want to support it on a fundamental level and customers en masse are clamoring for it — neither of those are necessarily true — there’s not a beaten path to follow, and beyond that those that are driving the cryptocurrency or NFT based business offerings, typically have little or no understanding of how truly complex the nature of the globalized movement of money (in any forms) actually is and what it takes to effectively and efficiently navigate such requirements.