OpenSea Takes Action to Weed Out Dormant NFTs on Ethereum

OpenSea, one of the most prominent nonfungible token (NFT) marketplaces, has released an update to its smart contract as a preventative precaution to remove inactive listings off the platform. All OpenSea users will be required to convert their NFT listings, which are now housed on the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain, to the new smart contract as part of the scheduled smart contract. This vital upgrade comes at a very critical time for the NFT marketplace, whose users were recently subjected to an exploit on dormant listings. While OpenSea has subsequently refunded the affected users, the incident has sparked concern regarding the marketplace’s security. Smart Contracts Upgrade by OpenSea Users on OpenSea will move their NFTs to the new smart contract as part of the update. The Ethereum blockchain is now hosting these NFTs. OpenSea has also said that NFT listings placed before February 18 will expire on that date. The announcement by OpenSea states, “New upgrade will ensure old, inactive listings on Ethereum securely expire and allow us to offer new safety features in the future.” According to the statement, once a user migrates the NFT listing, the original date of posting will be displayed. Users can relist their NFTs on the new smart contract once the deadline has passed. Users can move their NFTs for free. The previous Ethereum-based smart contracts will be rendered invalid, resulting in the removal of all dormant listings. User...