Over 80% of NFTs created using OpenSea’s free tool are fake, plagarised or spam

NFT or the non-fungible token marketplace has exploded in recent times. Companies from across industries are using NFTs for selling their digital artwork. In addition to this, NFTs are also being used by artists with modest means to sell their artwork. This sudden surge in the interest in NFTs has also caught the eyes of fraudsters who are using tools to help artists mint NFTs easily for theft and fraud. Case and point: OpenSea’s free NFT minting tool.

OpenSea, which is one of the largest NFT marketplace online, recently changed its policy for minting NFTs using its free tool called ‘Lazy Minting’. The company earlier this week announced that users will now only be able to mint up to five collections with 50 NFTs per collection using its free tool. “We know this change may impact our community so please don’t hesitate to share how this affects your creative flow,” the company wrote in a tweet that was first discovered by The Vice.

This change was met with intense backlash by artists who took to Twitter to share their concerns regarding this change with users complaining of being unable to upload their work or complete their collection.

Yo, encountered same theft regarding my own old art!

What I really disliked about filing their DMCA notice is that they provide literally all of your personal data including legal name and legal address straight to the offender. Like, they’re empowering the scammers even more??

— underwater astrꙮnomy🌌 (@cloudshores) December 15, 2021

Are you an artist who has had your work stolen and minted as an NFT? Please gather your receipts and send them to CirenSongOfficial at Gmail – over the coming months I am going to research and organize legal action against these platforms profiting off stolen work.

— Jon Neimeister (@CirenSong) December 9, 2021

The backlash by the OpenSea’s artist community forced the company to scrap its changed policy and apologise to its users. “To all the creators in our community impacted by the 50 item limit we added to our free minting tool, we hear you and we’re sorry. We have reversed the decision,” OpenSea wrote in a tweet.

In subsequent tweets, the company explained the rationale behind its decision. OpenSea said that it had originally built its shared storefront contract to make it easy for creators to onboard into the NFT space.
“However, we’ve recently seen misuse of this feature increase exponentially…Over 80% of the items created with this tool were plagiarised works, fake collections, and spam,” the company wrote in a tweet announcing the reversal of its changed policies.

Notably, while the company is reversing its decision of limiting activity on its platform, it’s working on creating alternative solutions to prevent fraud on its platform. “…we’re working through a number of solutions to ensure we support our creators while deterring bad actors. We commit to previewing these changes with you in advance of rolling them out,” it added.

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