Meta Eliminates Controversial Wording Addressing Scraping and AI Training Issues
Meta has revised its commercial usage terms, stating that it can utilize content from any business account’s domain, webpages, or URLs to enhance, develop, and maintain its products and services.
Legal analysts interviewed by Nieman Lab noted that this clause could potentially allow Meta to extract content from publishers with business accounts to train its AI models. Although Meta successfully defended itself in a notable copyright infringement case last year, various lawsuits targeting AI firms, including Meta, are still ongoing.
Despite initial concerns, a Meta representative affirmed that the updated terms do not signify a change in the company’s web crawling practices. According to The Verge, the contentious clause has been eliminated.
In a statement, the company clarified, “We’ve listened to your feedback and want to make it clear: the crawling terms we consolidated only pertain to our advertising and business products, which is specified in the terms themselves. This does not alter how Meta utilizes web crawlers.”
