Arbitrum Hits Pause Button on New Stylus Activations Amid AI-Attack Fears

Arbitrum has temporarily suspended new activations of its Stylus contracts due to concerns over AI-assisted attacks. The move, announced on October 2, restricts programs and app updates that require fresh activation.

This precautionary measure is in response to increasingly sophisticated AI-assisted attacks involving hand-crafted WebAssembly programs outside the standard Stylus compiler toolchain.

Arbitrum's documentation distinguishes between storing code and making it usable. New contract instances using identical program code can reuse an existing activation, provided it is still valid.