OpenSea Addresses The 'Elephant In The Room' — The Sale Of Stolen NFTs

Decentralized NFT marketplace OpenSea addressed its policy regarding the sale of stolen items on its platform.

What Happened: In a series of tweets on Thursday, OpenSea said it plans to incorporate user input in preventing the sale of stolen NFT.

2/ Our policy is designed to keep our community safe, but we know in some cases its side effects have damaged your trust in our platform. We’ve failed to proactively and transparently communicate the rationale behind our approach.

— OpenSea (@opensea) August 10, 2022

“So why do we have this policy? It is against US law to knowingly allow the sale and transfer of stolen items. We do not want to incentivize theft by allowing our platform to be used to help sell stolen items,” stated OpenSea.

“In some cases, the purchaser who unknowingly bought a stolen item (at no fault of their own) was inadvertently penalized. This is one of the most difficult issues we face. Please believe we take it seriously & we’ve been actively listening to your feedback on how to tackle it.”

Going forward, the platform plans to adjust how it implements this policy. Police reports would be used to confirm all theft reports, said OpenSea, noting that these reports have to be sent within a seven-day period after which buying and selling of the reported item will recommence.

The platform also said it will be making it easier for users who reported a stolen item to re-enable selling when theay recover the item with a simplified process.

10/ Beyond that, we are collaborating closely with ecosystem partners to help prevent and disincentivize theft, and building better education resources to help users stay safe in web3.

— OpenSea (@opensea) August 10, 2022

“We care DEEPLY about enabling users to operate safely on our platform. Allowing the sale of stolen items and operating with stolen goods is no sign of a healthy ecosystem...but neither is a lack of trust from those of you who got us here,” said the platform.

OpenSea’s statements were met with some degree of scepticism from market participants. Some users reported that they had contacted OpenSea staff about the course of action for returning a stolen NFT that was unknowingly purchased, but support staff directed him to sell it on another platform.

I purchased a stolen NFT, had no idea it was stolen and felt bad about it. I tried to make good on it and return it. The Discord was no help so I asked you. Your support staff literally told me to sell it on Looksrare. This was before you laid off 20%+ of staff. Make it betterpls

— MyFrenMyFren (@MarleyThunder) August 11, 2022

Price Action: According to data from Benzinga Pro, the cryptocurrency market saw a 0.33% decline to $1.15 trillion over the last 24 hours. At press time, BitcoinBTC/USD was trading at $23,982, down 1.4% over 24 hours and EthereumETH/USD  was trading at $1,900, up 1.32% over the same period.