Citing US sanctions against Cuba, OpenSea, the world’s largest marketplace for non-fungible tokens (NFTs), confirmed today that it is banning digital artists from all US-sanctioned countries.
The ban came to light last week after NFTcuba.ART, a project that helps Cuban artists succeed in the NFT industry, tweeted that OpenSea had deactivated its profile on the marketplace. Not only “Cubans on the island, but those of other nationalities must endure censorship in web3 company,” wrote NFTcuba.ART. The project claims that the sanctions are being used unfairly against Cuban artists who live outside the island nation.
A message on the collective’s website warned that the project was banned from OpenSea, saying this is “probably just because it has the name Cuba in it, or they are afraid of sanctions.”
However, the New York-based company said it is simply complying with US sanctions law.
“Our Terms of Service explicitly prohibit sanctioned persons, individuals in sanctioned jurisdictions or services from using OpenSea. We continue to comprehensively evaluate what other measures need to be taken to serve our community and comply with applicable law,” said an OpenSea spokesperson. Decrypt.
OpenSea also explained that “sanctions against Cuba are implemented by several legal authorities. They take the form of executive orders, federal statutes and regulations in the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR). The sanctions are complex and target certain activities, including economic activity, in Cuba . In light of these restrictions, OpenSea does not allow the use of its services from Cuba.”
As first reported by the Associated Press, Cuban artists insist they have never been told explicitly why their accounts were taken down, with some theorizing that OpenSea may be doing so out of an abundance of caution. Adding to the confusion is the fact that many of the artists are Cuban ex-pats, who no longer live on the island. The founder of NFTcuba.ART, Gianni D’Alerta, currently lives in the United States, while Gabriel Bianchini, co-host of a project that featured Cuban artists at OpenSea during National Hispanic Heritage Month, is Swiss-Italian and lives in Spain, according to Artnet News .
NFTcuba.ART did not immediately respond Decrypt their request for comment.
Who else is on the sanctions list
This is not the first time NFTcuba.ART has complained about the OpenSea ban. The project tweeted about problems it encountered in the market in March, urging artists and collectors to turn to platforms without such guidelines.
In March, Iranian artists also complained about being banned from the marketplace. “OpenSea blocks users and territories on the US sanctions list from using our services – including buying, selling or transferring NFTs on OpenSea,” a spokesperson for the marketplace said Decrypt at the time.
According to OpenSea, the marketplace has “a zero-tolerance policy for the use of our services by sanctioned individuals or entities and persons located in sanctioned countries. If we find that individuals are violating our sanctions policy, we will take swift action to ban the associated accounts.”
The US has extensive economic sanctions on North Korea, Syria, Russia, Cuba and Iran, and has actively enforced the policy. In October, the US Treasury Department fined crypto exchange Bittrex $53 million for allowing traders to avoid US sanctions in countries including Cuba, Syria, Iran and Sudan.
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