Acceptable Use Policy | Open Motives

In short: Use Open Motives to talk to people who want to hear from you, and publish content you have the right to share. Don’t spam, don’t break the rules of the networks you connect, don’t harass or deceive anyone, and don’t try to break or abuse our systems. If you find a security problem, tell us at [email protected] rather than testing it on live accounts. If someone breaks these rules we may remove content, pause automations, or suspend a workspace, and we’ll explain why.

About this policy

This Acceptable Use Policy (“AUP”) applies to everyone who uses Open Motives, including account owners, teammates, clients using the client portal, and anyone using our API or MCP server, whether directly or through an AI agent. It forms part of our Terms of Service and applies from 28 October 2026.

The account owner is responsible for making sure everyone in their organisation and workspaces follows this policy, including automations, workflows and AI Employees they set up. A workflow that sends a message on your behalf is treated the same as you sending it yourself.

These rules are examples, not a complete list. If you’re not sure whether something is allowed, ask us at [email protected] before you do it.

Spam and unsolicited messaging

Open Motives helps you answer people and keep in touch with customers. It is not a bulk messaging tool for people who haven’t asked to hear from you.

You must not:

send messages to people who haven’t given you permission to contact them on that channel, where the law or the network requires permission
buy, rent, scrape or harvest phone numbers, email addresses or social handles to message
send bulk unsolicited commercial messages, chain messages or misleading promotions
keep messaging people who have asked you to stop, unsubscribed or blocked you
hide who is sending a message, or use misleading sender names, subject lines or headers
use rotating numbers, accounts or channels to get around a network’s limits or blocks
set up workflows, comment-to-DM automations or follow-ups that send more messages than people reasonably expect

Respect opt-outs quickly. When someone replies “stop” or asks not to be contacted, stop messaging them and record it on their contact.

You are responsible for following anti-spam and marketing laws that apply to you and the people you message, such as the UK Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations, the EU ePrivacy rules, the US CAN-SPAM Act and Telephone Consumer Protection Act, and similar laws elsewhere.

WhatsApp, Meta and other network rules

Every network you connect has its own rules, and you must follow them. Breaking them can lead the network to limit, restrict or ban your account, page or number, which can affect your workspace and other customers.

When you use WhatsApp through Open Motives, you must follow the WhatsApp Business Messaging Policy, WhatsApp Commerce Policy and WhatsApp Business Terms of Service. In particular:

Get opt-in first. Only start conversations with people who have agreed to receive WhatsApp messages from your business, and keep a record of that consent.
Use approved templates. Messages you start outside the customer service window must use message templates approved by WhatsApp, and templates must be used for their approved category.
Respect the service window. Free-form replies are allowed only within the window the network allows after the customer’s last message.
Stay within allowed products. Don’t use WhatsApp to sell or promote products and services that WhatsApp’s Commerce Policy prohibits.
Make it easy to stop. Honour requests to opt out and make human help available when people ask for it.

If you link WhatsApp by QR code rather than through the Cloud API, you are using WhatsApp’s consumer features and must still follow WhatsApp’s terms. Bulk or automated messaging on a QR-linked number is likely to get that number banned, and you use that connection at your own risk.

Meta (Facebook, Instagram, Messenger)

Follow the Meta Platform Terms, Community Standards, Advertising Standards and Messenger and Instagram messaging policies. That includes respecting messaging windows (for example, private replies to a comment once and within Meta’s 7-day window), using message tags only for their intended purpose, and not sending promotional content where it isn’t allowed.

Other networks

The same applies to TikTok, YouTube, LinkedIn, X, Threads, Bluesky, Telegram, Facebook Groups, email and SMS providers. Follow their terms, community guidelines, automation rules and rate limits. Don’t use Open Motives to automate actions a network forbids, such as fake engagement, mass following or artificial amplification.

Illegal and harmful content

You must not use Open Motives to create, store, send or publish content that:

is illegal, or promotes or facilitates illegal activity
sexually exploits or endangers children in any way. We report such material to the relevant authorities
infringes anyone’s copyright, trademark, privacy, publicity or other rights
is defamatory, fraudulent, deceptive or misleading, including fake reviews, false health claims and scams
promotes terrorism, violent extremism or violence against people
promotes illegal drugs, weapons or other regulated goods without the required permissions, or in breach of the network’s rules
contains malware, phishing links or other harmful code
discloses someone’s private or sensitive information without permission

Harassment, hate and abuse

Treat the people you talk to with respect. You must not use Open Motives to:

harass, bully, threaten, stalk or intimidate anyone
attack people based on race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, disability, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age or another protected characteristic
organise coordinated abuse, pile-ons or brigading
send sexually explicit content to people who haven’t asked for it

Our comment moderation tools can help you hide spam and abuse on your own pages. Please use them, and report serious abuse to the network concerned.

Impersonation and deception

You must not:

pretend to be another person, brand or organisation, or connect social accounts you aren’t authorised to manage
suggest that you are affiliated with or endorsed by someone when you are not, including Open Motives
use white-label features to hide a business’s identity from its own customers in a misleading way
create fake accounts, fake followers or fake engagement, or run inauthentic networks of accounts
use AI to pass off generated content as coming from a real, identifiable person without their permission

Agencies must have permission from their clients for every account they connect and every message or post they send on a client’s behalf.

API, MCP and platform abuse

Our REST API and MCP server are there to help you work with your own workspaces. You must not:

access, or try to access, data or workspaces you aren’t authorised to use
get around plan limits, rate limits, scopes or other technical restrictions
share, publish or embed API keys where others can use them
scrape our website or app, or use automated tools to pull data from it, other than through our documented API
use the API or MCP server to send spam or to break any rule in this policy
overload, disrupt or degrade the Service, for example with excessive requests or denial-of-service attacks
reverse engineer the Service, or copy it to build a competing product
use workflow HTTP steps, webhooks, site crawls or custom MCP servers to attack other systems or reach systems you aren’t allowed to

You are responsible for every action taken with your API keys, including actions taken by AI assistants and agents you connect.

Security testing

We welcome reports from security researchers, but testing must not put customers or their data at risk.

Only test with permission. Don’t probe, scan or test the security of Open Motives without our prior written permission. To ask for permission, or to report a vulnerability, email [email protected].
Use your own accounts. If we agree to testing, use only accounts and workspaces you own. Never access, change or delete other customers’ data.
No disruption. No denial-of-service testing, spam, social engineering of our staff or customers, or physical attacks.
Give us time. Tell us what you found and give us a reasonable chance to fix it before sharing it with anyone else.

If you follow these rules in good faith, we won’t take action against you for your research.

AI misuse

Our AI features are there to help your team answer and create faster, not to deceive or harm. You must not use them to:

generate any content this policy prohibits, including spam, harassment, scams or misleading claims
impersonate a real person or pretend that a person is replying when, by law or a network’s rules, you must say it is automated
give regulated professional advice (for example medical, legal or financial) without appropriate human review
make decisions with legal or similarly significant effects on people without human review
get around safety measures, content filters or approval steps, including through prompt injection
break the usage policies of the AI provider you chose

Set up AI Employees responsibly: give them accurate knowledge, choose draft-for-approval where mistakes would matter, and make sure they hand off to a person when someone asks.

Enforcement

If we believe this policy has been broken, we may take action in proportion to the issue. This can include:

asking you to fix the problem
removing or blocking specific content or messages
pausing workflows, AI Employees or API keys
disconnecting a channel or account
suspending or closing a workspace or account
reporting illegal activity to the authorities or the network concerned

Where we can, we’ll contact you first and give you a chance to put things right. We may act without notice where there is a serious risk to people, our systems, other customers or our access to a network’s API, or where the law requires it.

If you think we’ve made a mistake, reply to our notice or email [email protected] and we’ll review it.

Reporting a problem

If you see Open Motives being used in a way that breaks this policy, for example spam sent through our website chat widget or a business messaging you without permission, tell us at [email protected]. Include as much detail as you can, such as the business name, the channel and when the message arrived. For security issues, email [email protected].

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy to respond to new risks, new features or changes in network rules. We’ll update the date at the top of this page and tell account owners about significant changes.