Operator signs a release
The happy path. The Operator reviews a delivery and signs an EIP-712 payout authorisation; anyone may broadcast it.
Engineering assessment, not a legal opinion
What follows describes what the contract mechanically permits. Whether it satisfies a given regulator is for counsel. Residual questions are listed rather than resolved.
What happens
releaseEscrow(escrowId, auth, sig) verifies an Operator signature over the payout authorisation, then pays the Creator address bound at funding.
The signature is the authority. The caller is irrelevant — VF's relayer usually broadcasts it so the Operator pays no gas and needs no ETH, but a stranger could submit the same signed payload and the outcome would be identical.
Smart-account operators authorise through ERC-1271, so a Safe or a passkey-backed account signs exactly as an EOA does.
Non-custody evaluation
Holds. VF cannot produce this signature. There is no secret in VF's possession that substitutes for it — that was the V5–V7 preimage, and it is gone. Without the Operator's signature the slot does not move by this path at all.
The destination is bound at funding, so even a validly signed release cannot be pointed at a VF address.
No-service evaluation
Strongest position of the six. VF's role is broadcasting a message the Operator authorised, to a destination the Operator fixed, in an amount the Operator committed. VF cannot originate, redirect or withhold it — a third party could broadcast the identical payload.
That is the classic shape of a technical service provider rather than a payment service: VF never enters into possession of the funds and never decides that a transfer happens.
Residual questions for counsel
- VF's relayer both holds gas and submits the transaction. It does not authorise, but it is VF-controlled infrastructure in the transaction path, and the earlier legal assessment flagged exactly that as the source of transfer-service exposure. The mitigation is that the authorisation is not VF's; whether that is sufficient is the question for counsel.
- If the relayer stops broadcasting, settlement stalls until someone else submits. That is availability, not custody — but it is worth being explicit that VF can delay by inaction, even though it cannot prevent.