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Arbitrum activates Elara, enabling optional compliance filters for dedicated chains
The ArbOS 61 upgrade goes live after governance approval, but compliance filtering and priority-fee collection remain disabled on Arbitrum One and Nova until separate owner or vote actions.
Arbitrum activated ArbOS 61 Elara on Aug. 20, adding optional protocol-level transaction screening, priority-fee support, and an alternative data availability interface for dedicated chains, according to The Defiant. The upgrade also changes base-fee administration and expands Stylus capacity on Arbitrum One.
The compliance feature is configurable tooling for owners of dedicated Arbitrum chains, not a new default screening system for Arbitrum One users. Arbitrum technical documentation cited by The Defiant says compliance filtering is off by default, chain owners must explicitly configure and enable each component, and they can choose an external compliance provider, such as TRM Labs or Chainalysis, to generate a restricted-address list and define rules for transfers, contract calls, and other interactions.
Enforcement is described in two layers. The sequencer simulates transactions and rejects those that violate the configured rules before they are included, and for transactions submitted through the parent chain's Delayed Inbox, a sentinel can register the transaction hash with an onchain guardian so the state transition function will forcibly fail it when included, helping prevent bypass through Arbitrum's force-inclusion path.
Elara also introduces a priority-fee capability, but it ships disabled. Only a chain owner can enable tip collection through an access-controlled ArbOwner precompile, and collecting tips alone does not change transaction ordering because a chain must update its sequencer logic to sort using the priority-fee field.
On Arbitrum One, Elara installs the underlying priority-fee capability but priority-fee collection still requires a separate constitutional DAO vote, and it introduces a BaseFeeManager contract allowing Offchain Labs to adjust the minimum Layer 2 base fee within a DAO-approved range of 0.01 to 0.10 gwei. The documentation also recommends chains wait at least 30 days after the ArbOS 61 release on Arbitrum One before adopting the compliance feature.