SANEF to Meta: Don't Steal Our Journalism to Train Your AI



By CITY REPORTER 

THE SOUTH African National Editors' Forum (SANEF) has called on Meta to stop its plan to take South African journalism to train its artificial intelligence systems without permission and without payment.

In a media statement issued on 5 November 2026, SANEF said it is joining journalists and news publishers around in the world in opposing Meta's new Commercial Terms.

Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger, announced the new terms on 8 October 2026. The terms would have allowed Meta to crawl and collect content from the websites of any business that uses its platforms.

SANEF says the revised wording still allows Meta to use that content to develop its business products, which include its generative AI services.

The organisation is calling on Meta to withdraw the crawling provision for news publishers in South Africa, to write any protections it has promised into its Commercial Terms, and not to use South African journalism to develop or power AI systems without negotiation and fair compensation.

SANEF is also calling on the Competition Commission to monitor the implementation of Meta's new Commercial Terms, and on the Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition to gazette the block exemption that would allow South African media to negotiate collectively with search, social media and AI companies.

According to SANEF, Meta was not required to pay for its use of news content under the Competition Commission's Media and Digital Platforms Market Inquiry. The company's only financial commitment was advertising credits, capped at US$1.5 million for all South African publishers over three years.

Meta has since delayed the new terms and removed an explicit reference to AI training after global backlash. Courts in Norway and Brazil have also blocked the company from implementing the terms.

SANEF says a pause does not resolve the problem, and that global rules on publisher consent and fair compensation for news are urgently needed.


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