OpenSea updates banned countries list sparking decentralization debate

cointelegraph.com:

U.S.-based NFT marketplace OpenSea has reportedly begun barring Iranian users from its platform, sparking outrage from NFT collectors and raising fresh debate about decentralization in the crypto space. 

On Thursday morning, Iranian OpenSea users started posting on Twitter that their accounts were being deactivated or deleted with no prior warning. Iranian NFT artist “Bornosor” vented frustrations to their 4,700 followers, in a tweet that quickly gained traction, garnering 342 retweets and over a thousand likes within a few hours.

Bornosor stated, “NOT A gm AT ALL. Woke up to my @opensea trading account being deactivated/deleted without notice or any explanation.”

NOT A gm AT ALLWoke up to my @opensea trading account being deactivated/deleted without notice or any explanation, hearing lots of similar reports from other Iranian artists & collectors.What the hell is going on?Is OS straight up purging its users based on their country now?

An OpenSea spokesperson said to Cointelegraph that it reserves the right to block users based on sanctions.

The current U.S. sanctions outline that American companies are not allowed to provide goods or services to any user based in countries on the sanctions list, including Iran, North Korea, Syria, and now Russia. OpenSea is a U.S. company with its headquarters in New York.

These actions from OpenSea have sparked fresh debate about whether large blockchain-based firms and services are adequately decentralized, with MetaMask joining in on enforcing sanction-based crackdowns.

I saw #OpenSea and #Metamask blacklisting and shutting down users on the sanction list.(countries like Iran, Cuba, Syria and so on)This was not the decentralized system! This was not the deal!

According to MetaMask’s