Automation, Bots & Scraping Policy

Effective Date: 2026

Last Updated: 2026

This Automation, Bots & Scraping Policy explains the rules for bots, scrapers, crawlers, automated tools, browser automation, data extraction, automated account activity, bulk access, automated playback, fake engagement, scraping APIs, unauthorised data collection, and related automated activity on Playflick.com, operated by Playflick™ Media .ltd.

This policy should be read together with our Terms of Service, Acceptable Use Policy, Anti-Spam & Platform Manipulation Policy, API & Developer Terms, API Data Use, Caching & Attribution Policy, API Keys, Webhooks & Developer Security Policy, Search, Rankings & Recommendations Policy, Invalid Traffic & Artificial Engagement Policy, Security Policy & Responsible Disclosure, and Account Suspension & Termination Policy.

1. Who We Are

Operator: Playflick™ Media .ltd

Website: https://playflick.com

Business Address:
41 Norman Avenue
London
N22 5ES
United Kingdom

Automation Abuse Support Email: hello@playflick.com
Contact Page: https://playflick.com/contact-us

2. Purpose of This Policy

Playflick protects users, creators, rights holders, developers, advertisers, and platform systems from harmful or unauthorised automation. Automated tools can create security risks, privacy risks, rights risks, spam, scraping, fake engagement, service disruption, and unfair platform manipulation.

This policy explains:

What automated activity may be prohibited
How bots, scrapers, crawlers, and automated tools may be treated
How approved API use differs from unauthorised scraping
What data extraction and automated account activity are not allowed
How Playflick may detect, restrict, or block automation
How users may report bot, scraping, or automation abuse

3. Feature Availability

API access, approved automation tools, crawler permissions, developer tools, rate limits, anti-bot checks, automation review, bot reporting tools, and related features may not be available to every user, country, account type, creator, business, developer, partner, plan, or integration.

Playflick may add, remove, restrict, redesign, suspend, or discontinue automation, bot control, scraping prevention, and developer access features at any time.

4. Automated Access

Automated access means using software, scripts, bots, crawlers, browser automation, headless browsers, macros, scraping tools, data extraction tools, or similar systems to interact with Playflick without ordinary human use.

Automated access may include:

Automated page loading
Automated account actions
Automated searches
Automated playback
Automated downloads
Automated data extraction
Automated commenting or messaging
Automated following, liking, saving, or rating

5. Approved Automation

Some automation may be permitted only where Playflick expressly allows it, such as through official APIs, approved developer tools, written permission, partner integrations, or documented platform features.

Approved automation must follow:

Playflick API terms
Rate limits
Authentication requirements
Data use rules
Privacy requirements
Attribution requirements
Security requirements
Any written approval conditions

6. Prohibited Bots and Automation

Users must not use bots, scripts, macros, crawlers, scrapers, browser automation, or automated systems to abuse Playflick.

Prohibited activity may include:

Creating fake accounts
Generating fake views
Generating fake likes, saves, ratings, or comments
Sending spam messages
Scraping profiles or user data
Extracting content metadata at scale without permission
Bypassing paywalls or access restrictions
Overloading Playflick systems

7. Scraping and Data Extraction

Users must not scrape, harvest, extract, copy, mirror, download, index, or bulk collect Playflick data, content, metadata, media, comments, profiles, analytics, search results, recommendations, rankings, or user information without permission.

Scraping may include:

HTML scraping
API scraping
Search result scraping
Profile scraping
Media URL extraction
Image or thumbnail extraction
Comment or review harvesting
Bulk metadata copying

8. Crawlers and Search Engines

Public search engine crawlers and legitimate indexing services may access Playflick only where allowed by Playflick’s technical controls, robots instructions, access rules, and applicable terms.

Playflick may block or restrict crawlers that ignore technical instructions, cause excessive load, scrape restricted content, collect personal data improperly, or violate platform policies.

9. robots.txt and Technical Instructions

Playflick may publish robots.txt files, meta tags, headers, API instructions, rate-limit notices, or other technical instructions.

Users and crawlers must not ignore or bypass these instructions.

Technical access being possible does not mean access is permitted.

10. Automated Account Activity

Users must not automate account activity unless Playflick expressly permits it.

Prohibited automated account activity may include:

Automated registrations
Automated login attempts
Automated profile edits
Automated comments or replies
Automated messages
Automated follows or unfollows
Automated playlist or watchlist actions
Automated reporting or appeals abuse

11. Automated Playback and Fake Viewing

Users must not use automation to generate fake playback, fake watch time, fake completion rates, fake impressions, fake ad views, fake livestream viewers, or false audience signals.

Automated playback may be treated as invalid traffic and may affect monetisation, recommendations, charts, analytics, and account status.

More information is available in our Invalid Traffic & Artificial Engagement Policy.

12. Automated Engagement

Users must not automate engagement signals.

Automated engagement may include fake or automated:

Likes
Dislikes
Ratings
Reviews
Comments
Replies
Shares
Bookmarks
Watchlist additions
Poll votes

13. Account Creation and Credential Attacks

Users must not use automation for account creation abuse, credential stuffing, password guessing, session hijacking, token theft, fake login flows, or account takeover attempts.

Playflick may block, rate-limit, challenge, restrict, or investigate automated login and registration activity.

14. Bypassing Access Controls

Users must not use automation to bypass access controls, paywalls, subscriptions, rentals, tickets, regional restrictions, age restrictions, parental controls, API limits, embed restrictions, download limits, or security measures.

Attempts to bypass access controls may result in immediate restrictions.

15. Media Downloading and Extraction

Users must not use bots, scripts, downloaders, browser extensions, network tools, or automated systems to extract or download videos, audio, subtitles, captions, images, thumbnails, artwork, or media files unless Playflick expressly permits it.

Downloading features, if available, must be used only through approved Playflick tools and according to applicable terms.

16. AI Training and Dataset Collection

Users must not use automation, scraping, exports, APIs, or crawlers to collect Playflick data, content, metadata, media, comments, reviews, profiles, images, audio, video, or user information for AI training, model development, dataset creation, facial recognition, voice recognition, profiling, or similar purposes unless expressly permitted by Playflick and lawful for the data involved.

17. Browser Extensions and User Scripts

Browser extensions, user scripts, automation plug-ins, scraping tools, downloaders, or unofficial clients must not violate Playflick policies.

Extensions and scripts must not:

Steal credentials or tokens
Bypass ads or required disclosures unlawfully
Scrape protected data
Download restricted media
Manipulate playback or engagement
Inject misleading buttons or overlays
Expose users to malware or phishing

18. Rate Limits and Traffic Controls

Playflick may apply rate limits, request limits, account limits, device limits, API quotas, playback limits, search limits, or other traffic controls.

Users must not evade rate limits by:

Rotating accounts
Rotating IP addresses
Using proxy networks
Using botnets
Creating multiple API keys
Splitting traffic across fake identities
Changing user agents to hide automation

19. Security Research

Security researchers must follow Playflick’s Security Policy & Responsible Disclosure.

Security research must not involve unauthorised scraping, data exfiltration, privacy invasion, service disruption, credential theft, user harm, or bypassing restrictions beyond what is permitted by Playflick’s responsible disclosure process.

20. Child Safety

Bots, automation, scraping, crawlers, and data extraction tools must not be used to exploit, sexualise, identify, harass, groom, manipulate, or endanger children or young users.

Users must not use automation to collect child data, contact minors unsafely, bypass child-safety controls, or promote exploitative content involving minors.

Serious child-safety concerns may result in immediate account action and reporting where appropriate or required.

21. Detection and Anti-Abuse Measures

Playflick may use automated systems, human review, rate limits, security checks, device signals, behavioural signals, traffic analysis, fraud detection, CAPTCHAs, account checks, token checks, and other anti-abuse measures to detect and restrict automation.

Playflick may keep some detection methods confidential to protect platform integrity.

22. Reports and Support

Users, creators, developers, security researchers, rights holders, advertisers, parents, guardians, or viewers may contact Playflick about bots, scraping, fake engagement, automation abuse, data extraction, suspicious API activity, credential attacks, or unauthorised crawlers.

Contact:

Email: hello@playflick.com
Contact Page: https://playflick.com/contact-us

Please include:

The account, bot, app, domain, API key, content, traffic pattern, URL, or activity involved
A clear explanation of the suspected automation or scraping issue
Any screenshots, timestamps, logs with secrets removed, request IDs, or supporting context
Whether the issue involves child safety, personal data, rights, payment, privacy, security, or legal concerns

Do not send passwords, full payment card numbers, API secrets, private keys, webhook signing secrets, parental PINs, or one-time login codes.

23. Enforcement

Playflick may take action where bots, automation, scraping, crawlers, fake engagement, automated playback, automated account activity, or related tools violate this policy or other Playflick rules.

Enforcement may include:

Blocking requests
Rate-limiting traffic
Disabling API keys
Restricting developer apps
Removing fake engagement
Invalidating traffic or analytics
Restricting playback, search, or account features
Restricting accounts involved in automation abuse
Suspending or terminating accounts for serious or repeated violations
Preserving records for legal, safety, fraud, rights, payment, developer, or security reasons

24. Appeals and Review Requests

If your account, API key, developer app, traffic, automation tool, content, or related feature was removed or restricted and you believe Playflick made a mistake, you may request a review under our Appeals Policy where available.

Contact:

Email: hello@playflick.com

Please include:

Your account or developer account email where relevant
The account, API key, app, traffic, activity, content, URL, or feature involved
The decision you are asking Playflick to review
Why you believe the decision was incorrect
Any supporting screenshots, timestamps, technical context, or relevant details

Do not send passwords, full payment card numbers, API secrets, private keys, webhook signing secrets, parental PINs, or one-time login codes.

25. Privacy and Data Retention

Playflick may process and retain automation detection records, bot activity records, scraping records, crawler records, traffic records, API request records, account activity records, security records, fraud signals, support messages, review records, safety records, payment records, rights records, developer records, and enforcement records.

These records may be retained for platform operation, security, abuse prevention, analytics integrity, child safety, payment protection, rights protection, legal compliance, moderation, appeals, audits, fraud prevention, and platform integrity.

More information is available in our Privacy Policy, Cookie Policy, Data Retention Policy, and Evidence Preservation Policy.

26. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Automation, Bots & Scraping Policy from time to time.

Changes may reflect new anti-bot systems, scraping controls, API rules, rate limits, developer systems, data protection requirements, legal requirements, safety requirements, or platform updates.

Your continued use of Playflick after changes become effective means you agree to the updated policy.

27. Contact Us

For automation questions, bot reports, scraping concerns, crawler access issues, fake engagement reports, API abuse concerns, review requests, or policy enquiries, contact:

Playflick™ Media .ltd
41 Norman Avenue
London
N22 5ES
United Kingdom

Automation Abuse Support Email: hello@playflick.com
Contact Page: https://playflick.com/contact-us
Website: https://playflick.com