# Meta indefinitely paused the commercial-terms update that would have let it scrape websites tied to Meta Business accounts; the Nov. 20 effective date is off and the old terms stay.

> Meta paused the commercial-terms update that would have let it scrape websites tied to Meta Business accounts; Nov. 20 is off and the old terms stay.

Published 2026-11-05T17:18:01-08:00 · Policy · Canonical: https://news.littlewolflabs.com/posts/2026-11-05-meta-commercial-terms-pause

**Meta indefinitely paused the commercial-terms update that would have let it scrape websites tied to Meta Business accounts; the Nov. 20 effective date is off and the old terms stay.**

Nieman Lab reported Thursday evening that Meta took down the preview of the proposed terms and published a Business Help Center update that reads: "We recently shared that we were updating the Meta Commercial Terms, Product Catalog Terms, Self-Serve Ad Terms, and Ad Creative Generative AI Terms. These updates are now paused and will not take effect on November 20, 2026. We are continuing to consult with stakeholders and will provide a further update when we have more to share. In the meantime, our existing terms remain in effect" ([Nieman Lab](https://www.niemanlab.org/2026/11/meta-pulls-down-controversial-terms-of-service/), [Meta Business Help Center](https://www.facebook.com/business/help/2481113349080785)). A Meta spokesperson told Nieman Lab, "We’re pausing the changes as we continue to engage with stakeholders and take our time to get this right." The disputed draft would have authorized automated crawling of domains "associated with" Business accounts — Nieman Lab’s October reporting on the proposed terms ([Nieman Lab, Oct. 15](https://www.niemanlab.org/2026/10/metas-new-commercial-terms-will-allow-the-scraping-of-news-sites-legal-experts-say/)) — a change publishers and legal experts said could pull in news sites that keep Facebook or Instagram business pages. Meta had already slipped the date from Oct. 30 to Nov. 20, trimmed the word "train," and promised a consultation after outcry, injunctions in Norway and Brazil, and a UK CMA investigation. The Help Center also repeats that "our crawling practices remain unchanged and content owners can continue to signal their crawling preferences using robots.txt."

*What to watch:* whether Meta’s next draft keeps an opt-out that publishers trust, and whether the CMA and foreign court cases force stronger limits than a pause. Until Meta posts new text, Business accounts stay under the existing commercial terms.