Community Guidelines

Our principles

Acast will always seek to safeguard freedom of expression and freedom of information for creators, advertisers, and listeners. And just as we promote free speech and the right to information, we also believe that conversations should take place in a respectful, safe, and relevant way.

As a champion of the open podcast ecosystem committed to uplifting creators, Acast enables podcast creators of all sizes to distribute and monetize their own content on our hosting platform. As such Acast does not in general engage in reviewing or controlling any content before it is uploaded or made available on the Acast platform, though we will act conscientiously when alerted to any inappropriate or harmful content (see below). As a creator or advertiser, you are solely responsible for all content that you upload to the Acast platform or that is uploaded on your behalf.

What is inappropriate content?

Inappropriate content may include, but is not limited to, content that Acast deems in its sole discretion:

  • is illegal, harmful, hateful, violent, dangerous, defamatory, fraudulent, libellous, abusive, offensive, obscene, threatening, harassing, bullying, discriminating, misleading, impersonating, or encourages self-harm;
  • infringes the rights of others, including copyright or trademark infringement;
  • violates another person’s right to privacy;
  • may harm Acast’s business, trademark, goodwill and/or reputation;
  • includes spam or viruses;
  • reasonably could be regarded as uploaded for any other purpose than distribution of podcast content to listeners, e.g. SEO optimisation or similar purposes/activities;
  • reasonably could be regarded as having been subject to any actions that artificially or in bad faith alter the streaming and/or download numbers of the content as measured by our platform;
  • mainly includes music, non-spoken and/or AI or other automatically created content;;
  • reasonably could be regarded as having been subject to any actions that may affect our ability to accurately count listens, impressions or the placement of advertisements according to Acast’s assumed standards; promotes, encourages or challenges others to act or behave in such a manner as described in any of the points above;
  • includes hosts and/or guests that may harm Acast’s business, trademark, goodwill and/or reputation.

Content moderation process

Acast will react and review content when we are notified of any content hosted or distributed on our platform that may be illegal or otherwise inappropriate as set out in these guidelines. Acast does not undertake active monitoring of content hosted on our platform (using algorithmic decision-making or otherwise).

After we receive a report of illegal or inappropriate content, a member of our team will review it to assess the claim. If we decide to remove or disable access to the content, we will notify the person who uploaded the content. We will also inform the person who made the report of our decision.

In the event of violations of our Community Guidelines, or any other agreement you may have with us, we also reserve the right to terminate or disable your Acast account and/or use of Acast services.

We have established an internal complaint-handling process through which content moderation decisions can be challenged. If you are located in the European Union and are still not satisfied with our decision after using our complaints-handling process, you can appeal our decision with the relevant national supervisory authority in your country.

How to report suspected inappropriate content

If you come across any content hosted by Acast that you believe to be inappropriate, we encourage you to flag this by contacting our team on takedowns@acast.com or submitting a claim here.

Updated on 18 January 2024