--- title: "Why Is Sam Altman Teaming Up With Jared Leto, a Creep With Extensive Sex Abuse Allegations?" description: "Last month, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's unsettling blockchain-based side gig seemingly got its Mars all confused." date: "2026-05-30" modified: "2026-05-30" authors: - name: "Victor Tangermann" job_title: "Senior Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor" url: "https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/sam-altman-jared-leto-sex-abuse-allegations" categories: - "Artificial Intelligence" - "Blockchain" - "Future Society" - "OpenAI" --- # Why Is Sam Altman Teaming Up With Jared Leto, a Creep With Extensive Sex Abuse Allegations? ![Composite image featuring a photograph of actor and musician Jared Leto and a photograph of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman on a yellow background.]() *Illustration by Tag Hartman-Simkins / Futurism. Source: Steve Granitz / FilmMagic; Max Cisotti / Dave Benett / WireImage via Getty Images; Shutterstock* Last month, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's unsettling blockchain-based side gig seemingly got its Mars all confused. Let's back up. The company, previously called Worldcoin and now simply called World, is developing software designed to verify the "humannesss" of people by scanning their eyeballs, a bizarre venture that has already been caught up in its fair share of controversies, from allegations of [insider token trading]() and [fraud]() to [exploiting people in impoverished countries](). [Several countries]() have [banned]() the company outright. In April, the firm announced that World was teaming up with another Altman-founded company, called Tools for Humanity, to sell the first tickets to global music sensation Bruno Mars’ upcoming world tour, via a new product called Concert Kit. The company was [forced to eat its words]() after Bruno Mars' team shot back that it had nothing to do with the venture. Tools for Humanity soon admitted that it actually meant Thirty Seconds to Mars, another act with "Mars" in its name. Another relevant fact about the band: it's fronted by actor Jared Leto — who happens to have been hit with a [startling number of sex abuse allegations](), piling onto World's existing controversies. The eyebrow-raising pairup is hoping to tackle an actual problem: ticket scalpers. Concert Kit was designed to cut reseller bots out of the equation by having Leto fans scan their eyeballs for a so-called "Humans Only Concert," a volunteering effort to be awarded with a special two-for-one ticket offer. Almost 1,000 verified humans managed to snag tickets for April 17 event, with Tools for Humanity claiming that it had successfully stopped more than 100,000 bots from snapping up tickets, as [*The San Francisco Standard* reported last week](). It's true that anybody who's attempted to buy tickets for a hotly anticipated concert within the last few years knows how miserable scalpers and bots have made the experience, with resale tickets often being sold for ludicrous amounts of money. But handing over highly sensitive biometric data to a shady Altman-founded company with a dubious track record doesn't exactly sound like a perfect solution. And that's without getting into Leto's connection to the project. The actor was accused by nine women last year of sexual impropriety, [*The Guardian* reported](), with one of them calling the behavior — which she says started when she was underage — "predatory, terrifying and unacceptable." While Leto has [denied the allegations](), it's hard to imagine a less inspiring partner with whom to launch the service — especially because Altman has [been accused of sexual misconduct of his own](). **More on the incident:** [*Sam Altman Caught in What May Be His Most Spectacular Lie Yet*]() ## Author I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()