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This page tracks TikTok's consumer-facing Terms of Service across 15 scrapes spanning 2023-01-11 to 2026-02-23, with 14 unique snippets. Genuine new content appears on only 5 of the 15 dates; the rest are unchanged re-scrapes or cosmetic link/markdown edits.

What this wiki found — complete, every page

Presence facts, not verdicts — each flagged term links to its definition and the exact clause on this page. Absence of a badge means the term isn't currently flagged here, not that the page is risk-free.

Independent reviews, where they had something to say

TikTok – Terms of Service

Dataset: PGAv2 (Platform Governance Archive v2) — 25 platforms, 2022–2026

PGAv2 (Platform Governance Archive v2) is this wiki’s legacy dataset: pre-tagged JSONL records covering 25 major social-media, messaging, and content-sharing platforms, with risk scores and keywords assigned via systematic extraction of 1,736 high-risk clauses from each platform’s Terms of Service, Privacy Policies, and Community Guidelines, spanning 2022–2026.

Note: This page contains documented policy clauses. Risk assessment is qualitative and context-dependent. For analysis of patterns across platforms, see:

• AI Act Substance Matrix
• Tier Bifurcation
• Scraper Enforcement Gap
• Methodology

Source: sources/jsonl/TikTok_Terms_of_Service.jsonl Last updated: 2026-02-23

Overview

This page tracks TikTok’s consumer-facing Terms of Service across 15 scrapes spanning 2023-01-11 to 2026-02-23, with 14 unique snippets. Genuine new content appears on only 5 of the 15 dates; the rest are unchanged re-scrapes or cosmetic link/markdown edits.

Distinctive drafting style: TikTok’s license-grant clause is unusually self-explanatory — each legal term is followed by a plain-English parenthetical (e.g., “royalty-free (which means that we don’t pay you for this licence)”). This is the most consumer-readable Content-license clause found in this wiki; the underlying rights granted are nonetheless broad (non-exclusive, royalty-free, transferable, sub-licensable, worldwide).

Major finding — genuine rewrite on 2025-06-25: confirmed via direct diff against the 2024-12-28 capture, this update does two things simultaneously: (1) it expands the license grantee from “TikTok” alone to “TikTok and our Affiliates,” and (2) it adds an entirely new clause: “You also grant to each user of the Platform a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide licence to access and use your content, including to reproduce… adapt or make derivative works…” — meaning, for the first time in this wiki, a platform’s Terms explicitly have users granting content-reuse licenses directly to other users, not just to the platform itself. This significantly broadens who can legally reuse a creator’s content beyond TikTok itself.

automated means is a genuine, on-topic disclosure here (confirmed: all 4 unique captures contain the literal phrase) — but covers TikTok’s own content-moderation/enforcement detection (“we… use a mix of technology (including through automated means), human moderation, and reports from users to identify breaches… and enforce these Terms”), a third distinct framing alongside X’s anti-spam usage and YouTube’s anti-scraping usage. The clause is captured alongside a disclosure of TikTok’s “For You” feed recommendation system — an algorithmic-curation disclosure that, while not explicitly AI-labeled, is the underlying mechanism by which TikTok’s content recommendations operate.

Flagged Keywords & Risks

• royalty-free, transferable, derivative works — Part of the core Content license grant (see Overview). Why it matters: TikTok takes broad rights over user content — non-exclusive, royalty-free, transferable, sub-licensable, worldwide. As of 2025-06-25, those rights extend to TikTok’s Affiliates and directly to other platform users, too — a wider pool of parties who can legally reuse a creator’s content than any single-platform grant tracked elsewhere in this wiki.
• automated means — A confirmed disclosure that TikTok uses automated technology, alongside human moderators, to detect violations of its Terms and Community Guidelines. Why it matters: this reveals that TikTok uses algorithms — not just people — to decide when you’ve broken the rules, similar to YouTube’s disclosure about its Community Guidelines classifier. It’s captured alongside (but not directly tied to) TikTok’s disclosure of the “For You” feed’s recommendation system.

Legal Context & Research Significance

The 2025-06-25 rewrite, which expanded the content license from “TikTok” to “TikTok and our Affiliates” and added a clause granting each platform user a direct license to reuse other users’ content, is the kind of unilateral, mid-stream contract expansion that wearetosed’s “unilateral control” category is designed to flag — the breadth of who may legally reuse a creator’s content grew without any new consideration flowing back to the user. Atkinson (2025) argues that scraping/training restrictions in a ToS become enforceable specifically because a bot that ingests the page has actual notice of the terms; the same logic cuts the other way here, since TikTok’s own “automated means” clause and broad, royalty-free, transferable, sublicensable content license demonstrate how a platform can structure notice-bearing text to maximize its own reuse rights while imposing scraping bans on others. The automated means disclosure of algorithmic content-moderation enforcement also falls within the “tracking & profiling” category, given its pairing with the “For You” recommendation-system disclosure.

Changes Summary

Version History

2023-01-11

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

Clause: royalty-free, transferable

Ownership of content and grant of licences We don’t own your content. If you are the owner of the intellectual property rights in the content that you make available on the Platform, then nothing in these Terms changes that. To provide the Platform, we need certain rights from you (called a licence). The details of these licences are set out below. By creating, posting or otherwise making content available on the Platform, you grant to TikTok a: * non-exclusive (which means that you can licence your content to others), * royalty-free (which means that we don’t pay you for this licence), * transferable (which means that we can give the rights you give us to someone else), * sub-licensable (which means that we can licence your content to others, e.g. to service providers that help us to provide the Platform or to trusted third parties that have entered into agreements with us to operate, develop and provide the Platform) and * worldwide (which means that the licence applies anywhere in the world) licence to use your content, including to reproduce (e.g. to copy), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to translate and/or create captions), perform and communicate your content to the public (e.g. to display it), for the purposes of operating, developing and providing the Platform, subject to your Platform settings.

Clause: royalty-free

to copy), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to translate and/or create captions), perform and communicate your content to the public (e.g. to display it), for the purposes of operating, developing and providing the Platform, subject to your Platform settings. The licence to your content that you grant to us extends to Affiliates as part of making the Platform available. You also grant to each user of the Platform a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide licence to access and use your content, including to reproduce (e.g. to copy, share or download), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to include your content in their content) perform and communicate that content to the public (e.g. to display it) using the features and functions of the Platform for entertainment purposes, subject to your Platform settings. Your licences to TikTok and to users end when you close your account or when you or we remove your content from the Platform in accordance with these Terms.

Clause: derivative works

The details of these licences are set out below. By creating, posting or otherwise making content available on the Platform, you grant to TikTok a: * non-exclusive (which means that you can licence your content to others), * royalty-free (which means that we don’t pay you for this licence), * transferable (which means that we can give the rights you give us to someone else), * sub-licensable (which means that we can licence your content to others, e.g. to service providers that help us to provide the Platform or to trusted third parties that have entered into agreements with us to operate, develop and provide the Platform) and * worldwide (which means that the licence applies anywhere in the world) licence to use your content, including to reproduce (e.g. to copy), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to translate and/or create captions), perform and communicate your content to the public (e.g. to display it), for the purposes of operating, developing and providing the Platform, subject to your Platform settings. The licence to your content that you grant to us extends to Affiliates as part of making the Platform available. You also grant to each user of the Platform a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide licence to access and use your content, including to reproduce (e.g. to copy, share or download), adapt or make derivative works (e.g.

Clause: derivative works

to display it), for the purposes of operating, developing and providing the Platform, subject to your Platform settings. The licence to your content that you grant to us extends to Affiliates as part of making the Platform available. You also grant to each user of the Platform a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide licence to access and use your content, including to reproduce (e.g. to copy, share or download), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to include your content in their content) perform and communicate that content to the public (e.g. to display it) using the features and functions of the Platform for entertainment purposes, subject to your Platform settings. Your licences to TikTok and to users end when you close your account or when you or we remove your content from the Platform in accordance with these Terms. However, due to the nature of the Platform and our legal obligations, the licence granted will continue after you have removed your content to the extent that: * you have allowed, via your Platform settings, other users of the Platform to use or reuse your content (e.g. by using Duet, Stitch, download or share functionalities); or * we are obliged to store or process your content for legal reasons.

Clause: automated means

Ltd.) (“Affiliates”) provide the Platform so everyone can use it, in multiple languages around the world. The Platform allows you and others to create, view, interact with, and share content, and interact with others. We also personalise your experience on the Platform, such as providing your “For You” feed in the TikTok app, which shows you content based on what we have determined could be interesting for you. We want the Platform to be a safe place, so people can be who they are and have fun. We work with our Affiliates and use a mix of technology (including through automated means), human moderation, and reports from our users to identify infringements of and enforce these Terms and our Community Guidelines in order to protect you and all of our users. We don’t charge you a fee to use most of the features of the Platform. Instead, businesses and organisations pay us to show you ads for their products and services, and we may also charge sellers a commission on products sold on TikTok Shop. Information on how we use data that we collect about you can be found in our Privacy Policy and Cookies Policy. These do not form part of this contract, but are important documents which we strongly recommend that you read.

2023-04-13

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

All clauses unchanged from 2023-01-11 (see above).

2023-05-05

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

All clauses unchanged from 2023-04-13 (see above).

2023-08-07

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

derivative works unchanged from 2023-05-05.

Clause: royalty-free, transferable

You can report suspected infringements of intellectual property rights on the Platform here: * Copyright: https://www.tiktok.com/legal/report/Copyright * Trademark: https://www.tiktok.com/legal/report/Trademark In short: You should read our Intellectual Property Policy and follow those additional rules. ### 4.9 Ownership of content and grant of licences We don’t own your content. If you are the owner of the intellectual property rights in the content that you make available on the Platform, then nothing in these Terms changes that. To provide the Platform, we need certain rights from you (called a licence). The details of these licences are set out below. By creating, posting or otherwise making content available on the Platform, you grant to TikTok a: * non-exclusive (which means that you can licence your content to others), * royalty-free (which means that we don’t pay you for this licence), * transferable (which means that we can give the rights you give us to someone else), * sub-licensable (which means that we can licence your content to others, e.g. to service providers that help us to provide the Platform or to trusted third parties that have entered into agreements with us to operate, develop and provide the Platform) and * worldwide (which means that the licence applies anywhere in the world) licence to use your content, including to reproduce (e.g. to copy), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to translate and/or create captions), perform and communicate your content to the public (e.g. to display it), for the purposes of operating, developing and providing the Platform, subject to your Platform settings.

Clause: automated means

The “For You” feed is a unique TikTok feature that uses a recommendation system to allow you to discover a breadth of content, creators and topics that are likely to be interesting for you. In determining what gets recommended, the system takes into account factors such as likes, shares, comments, searches, diversity of content, and popular videos. Learn more about the recommendation system and the tools you can use to customise your feed here. We want the Platform to be a safe place, so people can be who they are and have fun. We work with our Affiliates and use a mix of technology (including through automated means), human moderation, and reports from our users to identify infringements of and enforce these Terms and our Community Guidelines in order to protect you and all of our users. We don’t charge you a fee to use most of the features of the Platform. Instead, some individuals and businesses pay us to show advertisements on the Platform, and we may also charge sellers a commission on products sold on TikTok Shop. Information on how we use data that we collect about you can be found in our Privacy Policy and Cookies Policy. These do not form part of these Terms but are important documents which we strongly recommend that you read.

2024-11-23

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

All clauses unchanged from 2023-08-07 (see above).

2024-12-28

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

royalty-free, derivative works, transferable unchanged from 2024-11-23.

Clause: automated means

The “For You” feed is a unique TikTok feature that uses a recommendation system to allow you to discover a breadth of content, creators and topics that are likely to be interesting for you. In determining what gets recommended, the system takes into account factors such as likes, shares, comments, searches, diversity of content, and popular videos. Learn more about the recommendation system and the tools you can use to customise your feed here. We want the Platform to be a safe place, so people can be who they are and have fun. We work with our Affiliates and use a mix of technology (including through automated means), human moderation, and reports from our users to identify infringements of and enforce these Terms and our Community Guidelines in order to protect you and all of our users. We don’t charge you a fee to use most of the features of the Platform. Instead, some individuals and businesses pay us to show advertisements on the Platform, and we may also charge sellers a commission on products sold on TikTok Shop. Information on how we use data that we collect about you can be found in our Privacy Policy and Cookies Policy. These do not form part of these Terms but are important documents which we strongly recommend that you read.

2025-01-18

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

All clauses unchanged from 2024-12-28 (see above).

2025-05-06

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

All clauses unchanged from 2025-01-18 (see above).

2025-06-25

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

Clause: royalty-free, transferable

You can report suspected infringements of intellectual property rights on the Platform here: * Copyright: https://www.tiktok.com/legal/report/Copyright * Trademark: https://www.tiktok.com/legal/report/Trademark In short: You should read our Intellectual Property Policy and follow those additional rules. ### 4.9 Ownership of content and grant of licences We don’t own your content. If you are the owner of the intellectual property rights in the content you create or share on the Platform, nothing in these Terms changes that. To provide the Platform, we need certain rights from you (called a licence). The details of these licences are set out below. By creating, posting or otherwise making content available on the Platform, you grant to TikTok and our Affiliates a licence to use your content which is: * non-exclusive (this means you can still license your content to others), * royalty-free (this means we don’t pay you for this licence), * transferable (this means we can give the rights you give us to someone else), * sub-licensable (this means we can license your content to others, e.g. to service providers that help us to provide the Platform or to trusted third parties that have entered into agreements with us to operate, develop and provide the Platform); and * worldwide (this means the license applies anywhere in the world). This licence to use your content allows us to reproduce (e.g. to copy), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to translate and/or create captions), perform and communicate your content to the public (e.g.

Clause: royalty-free

This licence to use your content allows us to reproduce (e.g. to copy), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to translate and/or create captions), perform and communicate your content to the public (e.g. to display it), for the purposes of operating, developing and providing the Platform, subject to your Platform settings. You also grant to each user of the Platform a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide licence to access and use your content, including to reproduce (e.g. to copy, share or download), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to include your content in their content), perform and communicate your content to the public (e.g. to display it) using the Platform for entertainment purposes, subject to your Platform settings. Your licences to TikTok, our Affiliates and to users end when you close your account or when you or we remove your content from the Platform in accordance with these Terms.

Clause: derivative works

By creating, posting or otherwise making content available on the Platform, you grant to TikTok and our Affiliates a licence to use your content which is: * non-exclusive (this means you can still license your content to others), * royalty-free (this means we don’t pay you for this licence), * transferable (this means we can give the rights you give us to someone else), * sub-licensable (this means we can license your content to others, e.g. to service providers that help us to provide the Platform or to trusted third parties that have entered into agreements with us to operate, develop and provide the Platform); and * worldwide (this means the license applies anywhere in the world). This licence to use your content allows us to reproduce (e.g. to copy), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to translate and/or create captions), perform and communicate your content to the public (e.g. to display it), for the purposes of operating, developing and providing the Platform, subject to your Platform settings. You also grant to each user of the Platform a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide licence to access and use your content, including to reproduce (e.g. to copy, share or download), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to include your content in their content), perform and communicate your content to the public (e.g.

Clause: derivative works

to translate and/or create captions), perform and communicate your content to the public (e.g. to display it), for the purposes of operating, developing and providing the Platform, subject to your Platform settings. You also grant to each user of the Platform a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide licence to access and use your content, including to reproduce (e.g. to copy, share or download), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to include your content in their content), perform and communicate your content to the public (e.g. to display it) using the Platform for entertainment purposes, subject to your Platform settings. Your licences to TikTok, our Affiliates and to users end when you close your account or when you or we remove your content from the Platform in accordance with these Terms. However, due to the nature of the Platform and our legal obligations, the licence granted will continue after you have removed your content if: * you have allowed other users of the Platform to use or reuse your content via your Platform settings (e.g. by using Duet, Stitch, download or share functionalities); or * we are obliged to store or process your content for legal reasons.

Clause: automated means

The “For You” feed uses a recommendation system to allow you to discover a breadth of content, creators and topics that are likely to be interesting for you. In deciding what gets recommended, the system takes into account factors such as likes, shares, comments, searches, diversity of content, and popular videos. Learn more about the recommendation system and the tools you can use to customise your feed here (this information forms part of these Terms). We want the Platform to be a safe place, so people can be who they are and have fun. We work with our Affiliates and use a mix of technology (including through automated means), human moderation, and reports from users to identify breaches of and enforce these Terms and our Community Guidelines and any additional applicable terms and take action to protect our users. We don’t charge you a fee to use most of the features of the Platform. Instead, some individuals and businesses pay us to show advertisements. We may also charge sellers a commission on products sold on TikTok Shop. We charge you for some features of the Platform, for example, if you buy virtual coins (see our Virtual Items Policy).

2025-07-15

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

All clauses unchanged from 2025-06-25 (see above).

2025-07-16

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

All clauses unchanged from 2025-07-15 (see above).

2025-07-28

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

All clauses unchanged from 2025-07-16 (see above).

2025-08-12

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

derivative works, automated means unchanged from 2025-07-28.

Clause: royalty-free, transferable

You can report suspected infringements of intellectual property rights on the Platform here: * Copyright: https://www.tiktok.com/legal/report/Copyright * Trademark: https://www.tiktok.com/legal/report/Trademark In short: You should read our Intellectual Property Policy and follow those additional rules. 4.9 Ownership of content and grant of licences We don’t own your content. If you are the owner of the intellectual property rights in the content you create or share on the Platform, nothing in these Terms changes that. To provide the Platform, we need certain rights from you (called a licence). The details of these licences are set out below. By creating, posting or otherwise making content available on the Platform, you grant to TikTok and our Affiliates a licence to use your content which is: * non-exclusive (this means you can still license your content to others), * royalty-free (this means we don’t pay you for this licence), * transferable (this means we can give the rights you give us to someone else), * sub-licensable (this means we can license your content to others, e.g. to service providers that help us to provide the Platform or to trusted third parties that have entered into agreements with us to operate, develop and provide the Platform); and * worldwide (this means the license applies anywhere in the world). This licence to use your content allows us to reproduce (e.g. to copy), adapt or make derivative works (e.g. to translate and/or create captions), perform and communicate your content to the public (e.g.

2025-10-23

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

All clauses unchanged from 2025-08-12 (see above).

2026-02-23

• Explicit AI clause: NO
• Non-explicit predatory: YES
• Flagged keywords: royalty-free, derivative works, transferable, automated means

All clauses unchanged from 2025-10-23 (see above).