Usage policy
Also called Acceptable Use Policy
The rules for how people are allowed to use a product — the terms you agree to by using it.
Think of it like
A gym membership agreement: what you can do, what gets you kicked out, no rehanging on the equipment.
Example
A provider’s usage policy bans using its model for surveillance, disinformation campaigns, or generating malware, and violations can suspend the account.
How it actually works
Where content policy governs the content itself, usage policy governs user behavior and use cases — who can use it, for what, at what scale. It is the contractual and enforcement backbone, giving the provider grounds to act on violators. For AI it increasingly names high-risk use cases (bioweapons, critical infrastructure) as flatly prohibited.
For product teams
The document that defines acceptable customers and gives you a lever to cut off bad ones.
For engineers
The contractual boundary on use cases and scale; enforcement ties account actions back to its clauses.
Related
- Content policy — Governs conduct, complementing the content policy on content.
- Trust and safety — Enforced as part of trust and safety.
Read anything AI without the jargon
Look up any term in plain English, or save terms as you read with the free Chrome extension.
Open DecoderAdd to Chrome