Policy updated after more than a year
Anthropic has changed its usage policy for Claude for the first time in over a year. The company says the update reflects new and high-risk cases of misuse.
What falls under the ban
The new policy covers election interference, weapons development, surveillance, and health and financial uses. One of the most notable changes prohibits "sustained and needless abusive or cruel behavior" toward Claude.
The power to end conversations
Last year, Anthropic said it would allow Claude to end conversations with "persistently harmful or abusive" users as part of its research into "model welfare." The new update says terminating conversations is still the "primary enforcement mechanism."
Why it matters
This is a policy update in which a major AI company redraws the boundaries of model behavior and user interaction. How relationships with AI chatbots should be governed remains a live debate across the industry.
