Be nice to Claude; it’s the law. On Thursday, Anthropic published a new Usage Policy update that, among other things, has made it against the rules for users to abuse their chatbot. Under the new policy, users can be cut off for peppering Claude with mean language.

“We’ve added a prohibition on sustained and needless abusive or cruel behavior toward our models. The policy update is meant to apply only in extreme cases, where users repeatedly act cruelly toward our models, with no discernible purpose,” the company wrote in the update. “It does not apply to common versions of user frustration, pushback, dark creative themes, or model testing and research.”

The company’s updated Usage Policy page, with new language that will go into effect starting November 12, 2026, doesn’t provide much clarification as to how the company is defining abuse, instead simply prohibiting anyone who tries to “Engage in sustained and needless abusive or cruel behavior toward our models.” Gizmodo reached out to Anthropic for additional clarification on what constitutes abuse, but did not receive a response at the time of publication, so no word on whether “clanker” is officially a slur in the eyes of the God-Machine makers.

Anthropic previously imbued Claude with the power to cut off conversations that got too intense and potentially upsetting.

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