Meta has removed a specific clause from its commercial terms of use that previously granted the company permission to scrape content from business domains to train artificial intelligence models. The deleted text explicitly allowed Meta to use material from a business account’s web pages and URLs to develop and maintain its services. Legal experts had flagged this provision as notable because it appeared to give the tech giant broad rights to harvest publisher content for AI training without additional consent.
The change follows public pressure and clarification efforts regarding how the company handles web crawling data. A spokesperson stated that the original wording only applied to ads and business products, not general web crawling activities. This adjustment aims to reduce ambiguity about whether Meta’s automated systems can access third-party sites solely for model improvement. The removal signals a shift toward clearer boundaries between commercial data usage and general internet indexing.
* The clause specifically targeted business account domains and URLs
* It allowed content use for developing and maintaining Meta products
* The update was made after external feedback on the wording
