Does Our Privacy Policy Allow Us to License Data to AI Companies?
By Andrew Smart, founder of MON$TER · About
One of the first questions owners ask: "Does our privacy policy even let us do this?" It's the right question. Your privacy policy and customer contracts are promises, and a licensing deal should keep them.
This is general information, not legal advice. Have a qualified attorney review your documents before licensing anything.
What to look for in your privacy policy
- How it describes data use. Does it mention sharing with partners, using data to improve services or using aggregated or de-identified data?
- Personal vs. de-identified data. Many policies limit how personal information is shared but treat properly anonymized or aggregated data differently.
- Promises not to sell or share. If the policy says you never share data with third parties, take that seriously, even for anonymized data.
- Which version applied. Older records may have been collected under an earlier policy. See licensing old or archived data.
Check your contracts too
- Customer agreements: B2B contracts may say who owns usage or transaction data and how it can be used.
- Software terms: some platforms limit what you can do with data exported from them.
- Partner and vendor deals: data you received from others may not be yours to license.
Where anonymization fits
Licensed data should have personal information removed before anything leaves your systems. That's often what keeps a deal consistent with your policy. Learn the difference in anonymization vs. pseudonymization and see how owners protect customer trust.
If your policy says no
That doesn't always end the conversation. Some businesses update their policy going forward or license only data they clearly have rights to. Your attorney should guide that choice. See do I need a lawyer to license data?
Next step
Published MON$TER ranges: an exclusive one-time sale typically lands at $50K-$1M, and a non-exclusive recurring license typically runs $300K-$3M per year. No amount is guaranteed and not every company qualifies. Get a free valuation at /estimate/ or start at Business Data.