Meta Business Suite's updated commercial terms, effective Oct. 30, authorize Meta to use automated software to crawl, index, and analyze websites associated with business accounts, according to ZDNET. Legal experts cited by Nieman Lab say this effectively gives Meta permission to scrape those sites and use the data to train its AI products. Publishers using Meta Business Suite to manage their Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, or WhatsApp presence would have to accept the terms or leave the platform, as no opt-out is offered.
ZDNET notes that the move could let Meta avoid licensing deals with news publications, whose fact-checked and edited content is considered high-quality training data. This comes as publishers, including ZDNET's parent company Ziff Davis, have sued AI companies over use of their content, while some AI labs have signed licensing agreements with news outlets.
Meta disputed the characterization, telling ZDNET that it is simply consolidating its commercial and self-serve ad terms and that there is no change to how it uses web crawlers. The company pointed to robots.txt flags as a way for content owners to indicate preferences. ZDNET's report does not include independent confirmation of Meta's claim, and the legal experts' interpretation differs from Meta's framing.