Revealed: Adobe issues new terms of service giving it 'licenses to your content.' Law Enforcement Today is telling them to stick it

Adios, Adobe. It’s been fun. 

Law Enforcement Today and our affiliated companies have made the decision to cut ties with Adobe after their recent change in terms of service which would permit the company to look at your files and existing projects in what they claim is for “content moderation.” 

CNET reports that Adobe’s change to terms of service reads that the company “may access your content through both automated and manual methods, such as for content review.” 

The company claims it’s reasons for the change is to detect and remove illegal content, including child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and other abusive content or behavior, which includes spam and phishing. 

Adobe also claims that artificial intelligence (AI) makes it easier to “create realistic images and human-sounding text and audio,” CNET reported. 

Adobe isn’t the only company that likes to snoop on users. Google uses automated scanning and manual review to detect CSAM, as does Microsoft. Two of the big tech titans who like to spy on users, and now Adobe is doing the same thing. 

CNET noted Adobe made four changes in its terms of service, the first two in sections 2.2 and 4.1. For example, in section 4.1, the company says “we reserve the right (but do not have the obligation) to remove Content or restrict access to Content, Services, and Software if any of your Content is found to be in violation of the terms.” 

Other changes include the ability to delete content from inactive accounts. While Adobe says it will make an attempt to provide notice to inactive accounts to avoid deletion, the company didn’t say how long an account must be inactive before deletion takes place. 

Critics of the changes (and Law Enforcement Today and our affiliated companies agree) is that the changes now allow Adobe the right to access work generated from use of their various platforms such as Photoshop and Acrobat, including for training AI. 

According to LifeHacker, the section that is most concerning falls under Section 2.2, which reads:

2.2 Our Access to Your Content. We may access, view or listen to your Content (defined in section 4.1 (Content) below) through both automated and manual methods, but only in limited ways and only as permitted by law. For example, in order to provide the Services and Software, we may need to access, view, or listen to your Contante to (A) respond to Feedback or support requests; (B) detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security, legal, or technical issues; and (C) enforce the Terms, as further set forth in Section 4.1 below. Our automated systems may analyze your Content and Creative Cloud Customer Fonts (defined in section 3.10 (Creative Cloud Customer Fonts) below) using techniques such as machine learning in order to improve our Services and Software and the user experience. Information on how Adobe uses machine learning can be found here: http://www.adobe.com/go/machine_learning.

One user who took exception to the changes is Sam Santala, founder of Songhorn Studios, who blasted the company on X:

Another user, director Duncan Jones likewise called out the company for interfering with his movie in a since-deleted X post:

Hey @Photoshop what the hell was that new agreement you forced us to sign this morning that locked our ap [sic] until we agree to it? We are working on a bloody movie here, and NO, you don’t suddenly have the right to any of the work we are doing on it because we pay you to use photoshop. What the fuck?!

Users are prevented from using Photoshop until they agree to the terms of service, and worse yet, users cannot even uninstall Photoshop without agreeing to the new terms of service first. 

In response to the complaints, Adobe issued a “clarification” in their blog and on X.

The company claims that it “does not train Firefly Gen AI models on customer content. The company also says that “Adobe will never assume ownership of a customer’s work. Adobe hosts content to enable customers to use our applications and services. Customers own their content and Adobe does not assume any ownership of customer work.” 

That “clarification” does little to satisfy us at Law Enforcement Today and our affiliated companies. As the largest law enforcement-related media company in the country, we will be taking our business elsewhere.