Jasz
VIP Contributor
Infura, a decentralized application (dApp) hosting service owned by Ethereum developer ConsenSys, has reportedly blocked users from countries subject to U.S. trade sanctions. The news follows reports that MetaMask, a popular Ethereum wallet, also took steps to block users from blacklisted states.
In an interview with CoinDesk, Infura’s chief product officer Jameson Lopp revealed that the firm had introduced a “geo-fence” in an effort to comply with sanctions laws, which he described as “extremely complex and convoluted.” He said “We have a small team of folks who try their best to stay on top of the many new laws and directives in this area, but it is extremely difficult to do so when you are trying to build and support a product that is used by many different customers in many different ways.”
While the company apparently only recently implemented the restriction on users from sanctioned countries, Lopp stated that it had been working for some time on updating its terms of service (ToS) to address the issue and how best to convey it.
Users in Iran, Syria, and North Korea were all unable to use MetaMask as of Thursday morning UTC time, while those in Cuba, Crimea, and Sudan also appeared unable to connect via Infura.
