America Online updated TOS raises Privacy Issues
Instant Messengers, News March 14th, 2005
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America Online updated TOS raises Privacy Issues
America Online quietly updated their terms of usage of the AOL Instant Messenger which included many changes big enough to upset privacy advocates. The updated TOS (Terms of Service) applies only to those users who download the free AIM software on or after Feb. 5, 2004. It states that if the user uses the application, AOL has the right to “reproduce, display, perform, distribute, adapt and promote” all content distributed across the chat network by users.
In addition, it also quotes: “You waive any right to privacy. You waive any right to inspect or approve uses of the content or to be compensated for any such usesâ€. The user continues to retain ownership of the content passed through the AIM network but the new TOS still give AOL ownership of “all right, title and interest in any compilation, collective work or other derivative work created by AOL using or incorporating this content.
More problems are raised by these statements in the TOS: “In addition, by posting content on an AIM Product, you grant AOL, its parent, affiliates, subsidiaries, assigns, agents and licensees the irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide right to reproduce, display, perform, distribute, adapt and promote this content in any mediumâ€.
AOL has responded with a statement, which says: AOL does not monitor AIM traffic, and does not store it. A record of an AIM communication is not saved in any storage medium at AOL. They also pointed out that the update is not new — the current AIM terms were updated a little over a year ago.
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About
Just wanted to reassure you that the rumors flying around the blogosphere about the AIM Terms of Service are totally false.
AOL does not monitor, read or review any user-to-user communication through the AIM network, except in response to a valid legal process. The AIM privacy policy (which is part of the AIM TOS) makes that crystal clear:
“AOL does not read your private online communications when you use any of the communication tools offered as AIM Products. If, however, you use these tools to disclose information about yourself publicly (for example, in chat rooms or online message boards made available by AIM), other online users may obtain access to any information you provide.”
The second sentence of that same paragraph — and the related section of the AIM Terms of Service — is apparently causing the confusion. The related section of the Terms of Service is called “Content You Post” and, as such, logically and legally it relates only to content a user posts in a public area of the service.
If a user posts content in a public area of the service, like a chat room, message board, or other public forum, that information may be used by AOL for other purposes. One example of this might be a user who posts a “Rate a Buddy” photo and thus allows AIM to post it for other AIM users to vote on it. Another might be AOL taking an excerpt from a message board posting on a current news issue and highlighting it in a different area of the service.
Such language is standard in almost all similar user agreements, including those from Microsoft (appended below) and most online news publications. That clause simply lets the user know that content they post in a public area can be seen by other users and can be used by the owner of the site for other purposes.
Finally, there seems to be a misimpression that the change was recently made. In fact, the current AIM Terms of Service was last updated in February 2004 and has been in place for more than a year. The prior terms of service had very similar language reserving the same rights.
In short, AIM user-to-user communication has been and will remain private, the AIM TOS was not changed, and the TOS includes a standard clause on publicly posted material.
Andrew Weinstein
Spokesman, America Online
MSN TOS:
6. MATERIALS YOU POST OR PROVIDE; COMMUNICATIONS MONITORING
For materials you post or otherwise provide to Microsoft related to the MSN Web Sites (a “Submission”), you grant Microsoft permission to (1) use, copy, distribute, transmit, publicly display, publicly perform, reproduce, edit, modify, translate and reformat your Submission, each in connection with the MSN Web Sites, and (2) sublicense these rights, to the maximum extent permitted by applicable law. Microsoft will not pay you for your Submission. Microsoft may remove your Submission at any time. For each Submission, you represent that you have all rights necessary for you to make the grants in this section.
Perhaps that just tells us all TOS’s are evil. :P
Nah, but more seriously, this article said , so I see no misunderstandng.