How are the sanctions on OpenSea and Metamask implemented?

NFT trading platform OpenSea has banned Iranian users. A spokesperson said that OpenSea's terms of service explicitly prohibit sanctioned users or users in sanctioned regions from using OpenSea's services. There is a zero-tolerance policy for sanctioned individuals or entities and people located in sanctioned countries to use OpenSea's services. If OpenSea finds that an individual has violated OpenSea's sanctions policy, OpenSea will take prompt action to ban the relevant account. Current US sanctions prohibit US companies from providing goods or services to any user in a country on the sanctions list, including Iran, North Korea, Syria, and now Russia.

Similarly, on March 4, a user stated on social media that he was unable to use the MetaMask wallet in Venezuela. After investigating the cause, it was discovered that there was a problem with the API service provider Infura.

Infura responded that when changing some configurations in accordance with new sanctions from the United States and other jurisdictions, some settings were incorrectly configured, resulting in service interruptions in some regions. Apparently, Infura made some sanctions settings, which would also affect MetaMask.

These behaviors have surprised many users. Aren’t applications on public chains decentralized? Are they censorship-resistant and won’t cause 404 errors?

But that's not the case.

First of all, the blockchain network is composed of multiple nodes distributed in various places connected by the Internet. Its so-called decentralization will not be affected by centralization. If only one or several nodes crash, other nodes will continue to maintain the network operation as usual. It is like in order to prevent the network from having a single point of crisis, multiple operating points or redundant storage backups are set up.

At the network layer, node access is also through Internet facilities, which are based on the TCP/IP protocol of the Internet itself. Therefore, in theory, logging into the network means using another identity on the network.

In addition, the blockchain of the public chain network does not require permission to access. This is the open source and free rule followed by the network, and this rule also completes the anti-censorship function. Smart contracts on the public chain can be freely developed and used. However, although it is anti-censorship here, it will still be restricted by the rules of the network end and the rules of the front-end and back-end of the application.

What does an application include? It includes the front end, back end, and link end.

The front end is the official website and interactive page of the application we enter.

The backend is the application management and data management part built to match the frontend experience and some special functions.

The chain side is the part that develops the application logic that needs to use the blockchain in the application, publishes it to the chain, and interacts with the chain.

If link-end access is an unrestricted part, the unrestricted part mentioned here is through special tools, such as the development tool command line.

If the user uses the front end of the dapp, the front end first requires permission for the user to access, and at this time the front end is centralized. The access rights are within the one-year control of the development team.

Let’s take an example. About a year ago, Uniswap removed the display of several tokens in some regions due to some regulatory reasons. Uniswap is a decentralized exchange on Ethereum, but it cannot display several tokens in some regions. How is this achieved?

Currently, when trading Ethereum tokens in Uniswap, if the transaction list cannot be found, you need to enter the token contract to display it. If the token also exists in the liquidity pool, it can be traded. So, it can be freely accessed.

However, if Uniswap’s official website in certain regions cannot trade these tokens, although these tokens exist on Ethereum, they cannot be operated due to the front-end limitations displayed by Ethereum.

Let’s take a look at the sanctions on users in certain regions.

Opensea's trading platform is an application with a front-end, a chain end, and suspected to have a back-end. In a centralized exchange, we can see that our tokens are transferred to the exchange, which is actually transferred to the centralized wallet system of the exchange. Unlike this method, opensea is apparently fully utilizing the on-chain wallet system. This is why we have to spend a very high gas fee to open an account in opensea. The account opened is also achieved by the front-end calling the chain end.

But we can find that when we use the wallet, we connect to it after entering a platform, and we can switch networks. This is just like connecting to a wallet on Twitter, which is an operation of connecting to a decentralized account after having a centralized account system. This method is very common in many registered NFT trading platforms.

In addition, many of the NFT displays on OpenSea are displayed on the backend of OpenSea, and your own NFT should exist in the decentralized storage behind it, but for the front-end display effect, many platforms will do some processing.

Let’s look at metamask. This part is very interesting. It can be said that the metamask wallet plug-in is a stand-alone client downloaded to the computer. The operation of metamask is completely uncontrollable, but every action on the metamask plug-in needs to interact with the chain. This means that the address of the local machine must be connected to the network through the Internet, which will be limited by network communication.

The information communication of metamask is completely realized through the node interaction service of infura. That is to say, restrictions can be imposed on this part, which is the key to whether metamask can be used.

As a result, dapps on public chains still cannot get out of the centralized management of the Internet. First of all, public chains are not lawless places, but more of a place to realize value with the same nature as some borderless projects.

This is the case for applications on the public chain. Please use them as needed.