Accounts belonging to OpenSea users with Iranian IP addresses have been canceled amid growing controversy over international sanctions and Russia’s attack on Ukraine.
As pressure mounts on major cryptocurrency exchanges such as Coinbase, Kraken and Binance to restrict access to all Russian users and financial institutions on their platforms, other major players in the crypto industry are heeding the warning. Not only crypto exchanges are affected by this problem. OpenSea, an NFT marketplace based in the United States, also made bans.
OpenSea began blocking Iranian users on Friday, according to accounts by collectors and artists who have been unable to access the service recently. A large number of dissatisfied users took to Twitter to express their anger at the surprise measures.
A spokesperson for OpenSea has confirmed that indeed users in sanctioned areas have been banned. In a statement to CoinDesk, market representative said:
“OpenSea prohibits individuals and domains on the United States sanctions list from accessing our services, including from buying, selling or transferring NFTs on OpenSea. ”
Sözcü said, “We have a zero-tolerance policy for individuals or entities that are sanctioned, and for those living in sanctioned countries.”
Also, the pressure on cryptocurrency exchanges has increased. The White House National Security Council and the US Treasury Department issued an order this week on major cryptocurrency exchanges. Under the directive, the Biden administration asked cryptocurrency exchanges to ensure that “Russians do not use cryptocurrency as an escape route.”
In the case of OpenSea, the outage was reported by more than five Iranian OpenSea users, three of whom admitted to using the service while in Iran. Nima Leo Photos stated that their collections on the platform are no longer viewable.
Arman, an Iranian OpenSea user, reported that he was getting an error while trying to visit the market. Arefeh Norouzii said earlier on Friday that her verified accounts were removed “for no reason”.
Meanwhile, developer tool Infura, which helps build decentralized applications such as trading platforms and games, has blocked access in Venezuela. As a result, MetaMask, one of the most popular wallet and interface tools for users to connect with such applications, has become unusable.
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