Meta, AI terms and conditions indefinitely suspended due to controversy over 'unauthorized news collection'

Meta has indefinitely suspended the application of a revised terms and conditions that stipulated that it would collect content from websites such as news sites without permission and use it for artificial intelligence (AI) learning.

Meta announced on the 6th (local time) that it has decided to suspend the revision process for four cases, including 'Commercial Terms and Conditions', 'Product Catalog Terms and Conditions', 'Self-Service Advertising Terms and Conditions' and 'Ad Creative Generation AI Terms and Conditions'.

The new Meta Terms and Conditions were scheduled to go into effect on the 30th of last month, but due to opposition from the media and political circles, the effective date was postponed once to the 20th of this month, and eventually suspended.

According to Nieman Lab, a journalism research institute run by Harvard University, the original amendment stipulated that Meta could freely collect website content linked to corporate accounts of its social networking services (SNS) such as Facebook and Instagram and use it for AI learning.

Considering that major companies and media outlets have corporate accounts on Facebook and Instagram for promotional purposes, Meta's intention was to use the public content of most companies for AI learning.

It can be interpreted that the reason Meta has completely postponed the implementation of this amendment to the terms and conditions is because companies, the media, and even the political world have joined in the criticism.

Lawyers specializing in intellectual property rights pointed out that this is a poisonous clause that seeks to secure exclusive works and content without permission through a single clause.

In particular, the structure that forced users to agree to the revised terms and conditions in order to use corporate accounts was evaluated as an abuse of monopolistic position.

Some countries, such as Brazil and Norway, accepted preliminary injunction requests filed by media companies and suspended the effect of Meta's revised terms and conditions.

In the United States, two federal senators, including Adam Schiff (Democrat, California) and Marsha Blackburn (Republican, Tennessee, governor-elect of Tennessee), sent a letter to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg requesting the withdrawal of the terms, and the UK competition authority also began an investigation into whether Meta abused its market-dominant position.

In particular, the fact that many supporters of strengthening AI regulations were elected in the recently held U.S. midterm elections also appears to have put a burden on Meta.

“We are suspending the change to continue to communicate with our stakeholders and give ourselves sufficient time to make this right,” a Mehta spokesperson said in a statement.