eBay Blocks Third-Party AI Agents, Including Meta's Muse Tool

eBay has introduced a new restriction to the AI agent race in e-commerce by preventing third-party AI agents, including Meta's Muse tool, from browsing websites and scraping listings on the platform.

The eBay platform has stopped third-party AI tools, such as Meta's Muse agent, from browsing the site and scraping product listings. Muse, which previously allowed users to prepare daily summaries such as watch listings, reported as of last weekend that it could not pull any links or details from eBay and stated that the site had blocked it.

eBay spokesperson Sybille St. Arromand stated that artificial intelligence is integrated into the platform's discovery, personalization, and sales process, while noting a selective approach toward third parties. St. Arromand noted that they restrict agent access in certain cases, including unauthorized web scraping and data training, while Meta declined to comment on the matter.

In the e-commerce sector, retailers exhibit varying approaches toward AI agents. While Amazon completely blocks external agents from browsing its platform, Target permits them in some instances and restricts them in others, and Shopify has opened its catalog of one billion listings to allow shoppers to make purchases through their agents.