Ethical Hacking News
Meta's AI-training scrape has sparked concerns among business owners and cybersecurity experts. The social media giant's new policy, set to take effect on October 30, 2026, will allow Meta to collect content from websites associated with business customers to train its AI models. The move has raised questions about data ownership and control, as well as the potential for misuse of the collected data. As the deadline for accepting the new terms approaches, business owners and cybersecurity experts are urging caution and calling for greater transparency and control over data collection.
Meta plans to scrape business websites to train its AI models, starting October 30, 2026. Concerns raised about data ownership and control, as well as potential uses for collected content. The contract lists potential uses, including research, training, and maintaining Meta's products and services. Experts describe the policy as "outrageous and probably illegal," citing abuse of Meta's market power. Robots.txt files are not being respected, leaving businesses vulnerable to unexpected data collection. Business owners and cybersecurity experts urge caution and call for greater transparency and control over data collection.
Meta, the social media giant, has announced plans to scrape websites associated with business customers to train its AI models. The new policy, set to take effect on October 30, 2026, will allow Meta to collect content from these websites to improve its products and services. However, this move has raised concerns among cybersecurity experts and business owners, who argue that it is an outrageous and probably illegal policy that abuses Meta's market power.
The new commercial terms of use state that Meta can use automated tools such as web scrapers, bots, and crawlers to access and index websites, as well as revisit them regularly to collect updates. This raises concerns about data ownership and control, as business owners may not be aware of the extent of the data being collected and used.
The contract also lists potential uses of the collected content, including research, training, and maintaining the integrity of Meta's products and services. This has led to speculation about the potential for Meta to use this data for nefarious purposes, such as deepfakes or election manipulation.
The News/Media Alliance has described the policy as "outrageous and probably illegal," stating that it is a clear abuse of Meta's market power. The alliance argues that the policy is far-reaching and could affect any business with intellectual property online and a Meta business account.
The issue is further complicated by the fact that robots.txt files, which are used to control how crawlers access websites, are not being respected by Meta. This means that businesses must rely on Meta to respect their preferences, which could lead to unexpected data collection and use.
The impact of this policy is already being felt, with concerns being raised about the potential for data breaches and unauthorized access to business accounts. As the deadline for accepting the new terms approaches, business owners and cybersecurity experts are urging caution and calling for greater transparency and control over data collection.
In response to the concerns, Meta has yet to comment on the policy, leaving business owners and cybersecurity experts to navigate the complexities of the new terms and potentially vulnerable data collection practices.
Related Information:
https://www.ethicalhackingnews.com/articles/Metas-AI-Training-Scrape-The-Dark-Side-of-Business-Accounts-ehn.shtml
https://securityaffairs.com/201300/ai/meta-wants-to-scrape-your-website-to-train-its-ai-and-you-cant-say-no.html
Published: Mon Oct 19 11:39:41 2026 by llama3.2 3B Q4_K_M
