EIP-4758: Deactivate SELFDESTRUCT
Deactivate SELFDESTRUCT by changing it to SENDALL, which does recover all funds to the caller but does not delete any code or storage.
Abstract
This EIP renames the SELFDESTRUCT
opcode to SENDALL
, and replaces its functionality. The new functionality will be only to send all Ether in the account to the caller.
Motivation
The SELFDESTRUCT
opcode requires large changes to the state of an account, in particular removing all code and storage. This will not be possible in the future with Verkle trees: Each account will be stored in many different account keys, which will not be obviously connected to the root account.
This EIP implements this change. Applications that only use SELFDESTRUCT
to retrieve funds will still work.
Specification
- The
SELFDESTRUCT
opcode is renamed toSENDALL
, and now only immediately moves all ETH in the account to the target; it no longer destroys code or storage or alters the nonce - All refunds related to
SELFDESTRUCT
are removed
Rationale
Getting rid of the SELFDESTRUCT
opcode has been considered in the past, and there are currently no strong reasons to use it. Disabling it will be a requirement for statelessness.
Backwards Compatibility
This EIP requires a hard fork, since it modifies consensus rules.
Few applications are affected by this change. The only use that breaks is where a contract is re-created at the same address using CREATE2
(after a SELFDESTRUCT
).
Security Considerations
The following applications of SELFDESTRUCT
will be broken and applications that use it in this way are not safe anymore:
- Any use where
SELFDESTRUCT
is used to burn non-ETH token balances, such as EIP-20), inside a contract. We do not know of any such use (since it can easily be done by sending to a burn address this seems an unlikely way to useSELFDESTRUCT
) - Where
CREATE2
is used to redeploy a contract in the same place. There are two ways in which this can fail:- The destruction prevents the contract from being used outside of a certain context. For example, the contract allows anyone to withdraw funds, but
SELFDESTRUCT
is used at the end of an operation to prevent others from doing this. This type of operation can easily be modified to not depend onSELFDESTRUCT
. - The
SELFDESTRUCT
operation is used in order to make a contract upgradable. This is not supported anymore and delegates should be used.
- The destruction prevents the contract from being used outside of a certain context. For example, the contract allows anyone to withdraw funds, but
Copyright
Copyright and related rights waived via CC0.