What Meta's and eBay's Seller Terms Now Say About AI

Today, we cover:

1. Meta's updated Commercial Terms. On Oct. 30, the contract for anyone selling on Meta gains a clause that puts the risk of Meta's AI features on the seller.
2. eBay's older version of the same clause. It dates from 2024, and it now sits beside roughly 500 million AI-assisted listings.
3. Agents at the checkout. Both companies restrict outside software while building their own.
4. A shared shelf. eBay's listings appear in Facebook Marketplace under a clause that doesn't name Facebook.
5. Disputes and payouts. Individual arbitration at both, and a payments change at eBay on Oct. 28.

Meta writes the risk down

Anyone who uses Meta for "selling products" agrees to its Commercial Terms, under the Terms of Service. The current text took effect on March 6, 2024, and apart from a new notice address it is the same text a Wayback Machine capture showed in January 2025. An updated version takes effect on October 30.

The update adds a section on AI features. In it the seller is "solely responsible for and assume[s] any and all risks associated with such AI features and any resulting Content." It also adds a rule that a seller "must not alter or remove any watermark or content-authenticating metadata generated by AI in connection with Content." The sentence names no vendor, and it doesn't say whether routine image compression counts.

Two more additions bear on the same risk. Meta "reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to modify, limit, suspend, or discontinue any commercial products, services, and features at any time without prior notice or liability." And the seller becomes "solely responsible for the acts or omissions of any third-party software or service that you use or authorize."

eBay got there first

eBay's User Agreement says a seller "assume[s] full responsibility for the item offered and the accuracy and content of the listing, including listing content created using tools offered by eBay or third parties such as translation, image editing, and generative artificial intelligence tools." That sentence is in the version effective July 26, 2024, which a Wayback capture preserves. It is not new.

What has changed is the volume. On its first-quarter earnings call, eBay said "sellers have created roughly 500 million listings using our AI tools," and that the US rollout of its Magical Listing tool "has driven a greater than 50% increase in new listing creation rate." Section 2 of the same agreement says that eBay's own AI tools' "availability and accuracy … are not guaranteed."

Agents are for the platform

In February, eBay's User Agreement began to bar automated means "including, without limitation buy-for-me agents, LLM-driven bots, or any end-to-end flow that attempts to place orders without human review," unless eBay gives "prior express permission." Its robots.txt says "Checkouts are strictly for human users." On the earnings call above, eBay also said, "We see agentic AI as a real structural tailwind for eBay Inc.," and described an agentic search beta of its own.

Meta's position is the mirror image. Its personal agent, Muse, launched in the US on September 8, "can open a browser, fill out forms, and negotiate on their behalf," and checks with the person before "making a purchase." The updated Commercial Terms let Meta use "automated software (such as web scrapers, bots, robots, spiders, crawlers, and user agents)" and "create test credentials" to crawl the domains tied to a seller's products, and to use what it finds to "provide, develop, improve, research, train, and maintain the integrity of" its products.

One shelf, two contracts

Meta announced in January 2025 that select eBay listings would appear in Facebook Marketplace. In November 2025, Meta wrote that "you'll be taken to the partner's site for checkout," and in April eBay said the integration had "transitioned to general availability" in the US, Germany and France.

For an eBay seller, the contractual basis is a sentence in the User Agreement: eBay "may publish and promote your listings, including related content such as username, product reviews and feedback, in any format and through any channel, including across any eBay Services, our partners, or third-party property or advertising medium." Facebook isn't named, and the clause itself carries no opt-out.

Disputes and payouts

Meta's Commercial Terms send US business claims to "binding arbitration on an individual basis; class actions and jury trials are not permitted," and cap its liability at "one hundred dollars ($100) or the amount you have paid us in the past twelve months," whichever is greater. A seller who wanted out had 30 days from first accepting any version containing the arbitration clause. Claims over intellectual property and over automated access to Meta's products are excluded from arbitration.

eBay's agreement also confines claims to individual proceedings. Since February 20 it has let only new users opt out, within 30 days of first accepting it. Its Payments Terms of Use change for existing sellers on October 28, and for a US seller eligible for the new eBay balance account, "failure to complete or pass identity verification will result in suspension of your eBay balance enrollment and you will not be able to receive disbursements of Manage Payments transactions until successful verification is completed."

The tools belong to the platforms, and the responsibility for what they produce belongs to the seller.