Adobe has updated its user agreement which now allows the company to officially access and view the content created by users of its apps and stored in the cloud.
Artist Sam Santala was one of the first to express his concern about this new policy on social media platform X. He stated, “I cannot use Photoshop unless I agree that you will have full access to everything I produce with it, including my NDA [non-disclosure agreement] work”, requesting Adobe for clarifications.
An examination of Adobe’s general user agreement shows that the last modifications were made on February 17, 2024. The company revised sections 2.2 and 4.1, elucidating how it accesses user content and how that information is processed. These amendments indicate that Adobe can access and view user content in both automatic and manual ways, but only when legally permitted.
This suggests that Adobe can utilise technologies such as machine learning to enhance its services and software by accessing user-generated content. This approach, however, has been met with opposition from a number of Adobe product users, some of whom have even stated their intent to switch to competitors’ products or open-source applications.
It should be noted that customers with personal Creative and Document Cloud accounts will have the ability to block analysis of their content, at least when it is being utilized to improve Adobe’s products. A company representative has also once again assured users that their content will not be utilized for training generative neural networks.
