By George Ward
Earlier this week, ConsenSys, an Ethereum blockchain company, upgraded its privacy policy. The company revealed in the updated policy that the MetaMask wallet would start gathering specific individual data.
The announcement caused chaos in the MetaMask community as several users condemned the platform’s decision. However, the co-founder of the wallet promised to fix the issue soon.
ConsenSys Announces How It Plans To Collect User Data
ConsenSys updated its privacy rule, which explains how the firm “collects, utilizes, discloses, and saves personal details of website users.” Its websites include infura.io, codefi.consensys.net, and metamask.io.
The post described how Infura gathers information. Infura is the default RPC (Remote Procedure Call) for MetaMask. The post noted that when users use Infura on MetaMask, the app will collect the user’s ETH wallet address and IP address.
Infura is a toolkit for developing apps that link to the Ether blockchain. ConsenSys owns both MetaMask and Infura. RPCs enable transmission with servers and program activation at a distant place.
If users do not want Infura to collect their details, they can use a 3rd party RPC provider or an individual ETH node with MetaMask. Information collected includes user info like date of birth, gender, username, and name, profile information, contact, and financial information.
User Community Reacts To The News
Famous Chinese crypto journalist, Colin Wu, broke the news on Twitter. Thus, crypto Twitter started voicing their displeasure with the decision.
Dan Finlay, the co-founder of MetaMask, joined the conversation. He noted that the platform does not use users’ IPs for any purpose.
“We can fix this soon. Although IP addresses are stored temporarily, we do not use them for anything,” he stated.
However, he noted they would resolve the matter after the US Thanksgiving holiday. MetaMask is among the most used crypto wallet in the crypto ecosystem.
Hence, it has a sizeable number of active users who did not receive the news with open arms. Instead, many clamored for a push towards DeFi and Web3, with user privacy protection.
Others argue that invading users’ privacy is something centralized and Web2 platforms do. However, a few users spoke in favor of ConsenSys.
According to the supporters, the platform aims toward transparency and openness. Anthony Sassano, an ETH advocate, suggests that MetaMask should switch RPC providers. Sassano stated that there are other better alternatives.
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