OpenSea Launches new Listing Manager After $1.3 Million Worth of NFTs Were Stolen

The number one non-fungible token marketplace, OpenSea, has announced that it’s launching a new listing manager. This came after a hack on the platform led to users losing over $1 million worth of NFTs.

OpenSea’s bug Leads to NFT Loss

The hackers exploited a bug on OpenSea’s user interface that made it possible to buy the NFTs way below their market value. They then resold the same digital tokens immediately for profits. At least three individual hackers took advantage of this bug, making over a million in the process.

** Urgent ** There is an @opensea devastating bug that will keep old listing and allow exploiters to buy the NFT using their API. Immediate action is to move your NFT to a new wallet or wallet without any previous listing. I will add a 🧵about it very soon

— Rotem Yakir 🍊 🌐 (@yakirrotem) January 24, 2022

According to a report from Elliptic, the attack resulted from the fact that users could relist an NFT at a new price without canceling the initial listing. This makes it possible for anyone who saw the initial listing to swoop in and buy way below the newly intended price.

One of the attackers was able to buy 7 NFTs for $133,000 and resold them for $934,000. Another purchased a Mutant Ape Yacht Club NFT for $10,600 and sold it for $34,800 worth of ETH. This bug has been on the platform for weeks before its current exploitation.

Crypto Community Reacts to OpenSea’s new Solution

With the new listing manager feature, users will be able to see what they’ve listed for sale and edit it appropriately. According to OpenSea, it can’t cancel listings for users, and that’s why it has developed this new feature.

What's going on:
Listings made a long time ago are resurfacing when items transfer back into lister’s wallets.

What we did:
We can't cancel these orders for listers, so to fix the problem, we launched a new listings manager today.https://t.co/jy2sUhaBUA pic.twitter.com/6b8lHmkEYN

— OpenSea (@opensea) January 24, 2022

But some users are complaining that this feature doesn’t solve the problem for those who lost their NFT. One user asked why it was not possible for a listing to be auto-canceled on transfer to a new wallet.

Yeah ok. But how are you gonna help those people who lost a BAYC for 0.77ETH and then it sold for 185ETH. Those who lost them for 3ETH and 6EH Just to watch them sell for 85 ETH+????

It's too late to say sorry @opensea

— $TOTOS (@TotosNFT) January 25, 2022

Other members of the crypto community have also commented on the exploit. The CTO of Ledger, Charles Guillemet, stated on Twitter that listing assets on OpenSea is unsafe. Jenna Pilgrim, the CEO of Streambed, a blockchain media startup, also said that while OpenSea has a great interface, it’s at the detriment of security.

This is not the first time the NFT platform is in the news this year. The marketplace recently broke its monthly trading volume record with weeks to spare, leveraging on the growing popularity of the space.