NFT marketplace OpenSea seems to be constantly battling every issue that faces that Web3 scene. And as we've reported in the past, that very much includes rampant theft, with artists and NFT owners alike finding their work sold on the platform without their permission. Now, OpenSea is changing its policy when it comes to dealing with such theft, and it's only going to make life harder for the victims.
Anyone reporting that their work or tokens have been stolen and sold on OpenSea will have to produce a police report to have it removed from the site. This is being done to prevent apparent "false reports", and to avoid punishing those who inadvertently buy stolen NFTs.
"We're expanding the ways we use police reports", reads a Twitter thread from OpenSea, explaining the policy change. "We've always used them for escalated disputes, but they'll now be used to confirm all theft reports.
"For all reports going forward, if we don't receive a police report within seven days, we’ll re-enable buying and selling for the reported item. This change will help prevent false reports."
Yes, this new policy will require NFT owners to call the police if their monkey JPEG is stolen. It remains to be seen how police forces across the world respond to such calls, or how OpenSea hopes to monitor this when different countries will have vastly different systems in place.
Unsurprisingly, the move has divided opinion. Some are laughing at the idea that crypto bros will be calling the police to report their NFT as stolen. Whereas others - the crypto bros in question - are actually relieved to see this change come into place, frustrated that so many NFTs had been locked due to theft reports. Which, uh, suggests that maybe they should be angry that the thieves, not the original owners that reported the theft. But making it much harder to report in the first place works too, I guess.
The policy is in place now, and will likely see many more NFTs available to purchase on the site - just don't be surprised if you get some angry DMs from the original owner.