TikTok · TikTok Terms of Service

Prohibition on Scraping and Data Extraction

Medium severity
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Consumer impact (what this means for users)

TikTok's Terms grant the company a permanent, irrevocable, royalty-free worldwide license to use all content you post — including videos, messages, and AI interaction inputs — to train machine learning models, meaning your creative work could fuel TikTok's AI systems indefinitely even after you stop using the platform. The mandatory arbitration clause and class action waiver mean you cannot join other users in a lawsuit against TikTok, significantly limiting your legal recourse if your rights are violated. You can opt out of mandatory arbitration by sending written notice to TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC within 30 days of first agreeing to these Terms.

How other platforms handle this

Amazon Medium

No Abuse. You may not use the Services to engage in, foster, or promote illegal, abusive, or irresponsible behavior, including: carrying out or enabling denial of service attacks; generating, distributing, publishing or facilitating unsolicited mass email or other messages; or otherwise causing disr...

GitHub Medium

GitHub provides the Website and the Service "as is" and "as available," without warranty of any kind. Without limiting this, we expressly disclaim all warranties, whether express, implied or statutory, regarding the Website and the Service including without limitation any warranty of merchantability...

LinkedIn Medium

LinkedIn makes no representation or warranty about the Services, including any representation that the Services will be uninterrupted or error-free, and provide the Services (including content and information) on an 'as is' and 'as available' basis.

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Why it matters (compliance & risk perspective)

This sweeping prohibition on data scraping, while common in platform ToS, limits researchers' and journalists' ability to independently audit TikTok's content ecosystem — which has significant public interest implications given TikTok's scale and ongoing national security debates.

View original clause language
scrape, crawl, export or otherwise extract any data or content in any form, for any purpose, from the Platform using any automated system or software, including automated "bots," except as approved in writing by TikTok USDS Joint Venture,

Provision details

Document information
Document
TikTok Terms of Service
Entity
TikTok
Document last updated
March 24, 2026
Tracking information
First tracked
March 6, 2026
Last verified
April 27, 2026
Record ID
CA-P-002457
Document ID
CA-D-00032
Evidence Provenance
Source URL
Wayback Machine
SHA-256
d3539721aabef48180e1d19544aec3d5ebb50fb5a6fa66c261148d6a86e4976d
Verified
✓ Snapshot stored   ✓ Change verified
How to Cite
ConductAtlas Policy Archive
Entity: TikTok | Document: TikTok Terms of Service | Record: CA-P-002457
Captured: 2026-03-06 20:11:40 UTC | SHA-256: d3539721aabef481…
URL: https://conductatlas.com/platform/tiktok/tiktok-terms-of-service/prohibition-on-scraping-and-data-extraction/
Accessed: April 29, 2026
Classification
Severity
Medium
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