Arbitrum Blocks New Stylus Contract Activations on One and Nova

Arbitrum has temporarily stopped new Stylus contract activations on its One and Nova networks as a precaution against potential attacks involving AI-assisted tools, while existing applications and Solidity contracts continue to work.

The restriction covers programs that need their first activation and updates to applications. Already active Stylus applications can keep running. Developers can also extend existing programs through a permissionless renewal process, but cannot activate expired programs or new application versions.

The measure addresses a potential threat to WebAssembly programs built with nonstandard Stylus compiler toolchains. The identified concerns are disruption to on-chain activity and denial-of-service attacks; no risk of stolen funds has been identified.

Stylus lets developers build programs for Arbitrum using WebAssembly. The temporary restriction applies to new activations on both networks.