Curious activity involving thousands of Safe deployments to the Optimism network caused a Twitter uproar, with some suspecting an attack. However, Worldcoin’s developer confirmed it was simply a case of app migration.
A recent flood of Safe deployments to the Optimism network has been attributed to Worldcoin, as confirmed by Tiago Sada, Tools for Humanity’s head of product and Worldcoin’s lead developer, in a social media update on June 27. This surge in deployments sparked a wave of speculation on Twitter as netizens attempted to decipher the reason behind this phenomenon. Theories ranged from it being a form of Sybil attack to a profiteering tactic aimed at harvesting coins sent erroneously to the wrong addresses.
A Safe, formerly known as “Gnosis Safe”, operates as a multisignature smart contract wallet. Development teams widely use it to maintain a level of security and assurance that multiple team members endorse each transaction involving shared funds or application upgrades. This feature is also popular in newer consumer wallets utilizing account abstraction, offering gas-free transactions.
Worldcoin is recognized for its extensive use of Safes as part of its service, providing gas-free transactions to verified users. The Worldcoin team recently shared plans to shift its application from Polygon to Optimism.
Between June 21 and June 27, an Optimism address initiated the creation of more than 50 subaccounts, each performing between 10,000 and 15,000 transactions, with most generating new Safe wallets. On June 26, on-chain researcher Spreek noted these peculiar transactions and alerted the community via a Twitter thread.
Spreek conveyed his confusion over these transactions, suggesting a possible misunderstanding, as Gnosis Safes were complex to him. GnosisDAO contributor Luigi.eth responded, confirming that the Gnosis team had been notified, but the transactions did not seem to be harmful.
The Twitter thread drew the attention of Parsec Finance founder Will Sheehan, who hinted that the cause could be deduced with some certainty, fueling further speculation among his followers. Some believed the deployments were part of a Sybil attack or a ploy to collect addresses that could accidentally receive future funds.
A few users speculated that the deployments were not part of an attack but a sign of Worldcoin’s impending migration to the Optimism network. One user suggested that “eyeball coin” – a reference to Worldcoin’s iris-scanning identity verification device called “the Orb” – could be behind these transactions.
Within an hour, Sada from Tools for Humanity put an end to the speculation by confirming that Worldcoin’s migration was indeed the source of these transactions. As a result, Optimism users can rest easy, as these transactions do not indicate an imminent Sybil attack or address-farming scam.
Optimism transitioned to its new “Bedrock” version on June 6, offering lower fees and faster deposit times, causing a substantial increase in its transaction count post the upgrade.