FeedPilot is built on a simple position: people should be able to shape the digital experience placed in front of them, especially when a feed is not necessarily designed to be optimized for their interest. Users should also be able to bring tools to that experience, particularly tools that protect attention, privacy, safety, accessibility, learning, and personal goals.

This page elaborates our legal and ethical position: digital self-determination is the baseline.

1. User-side autonomy, not account takeover

FeedPilot is designed as a user-directed extension. The user remains in an authenticated session they control, uses an account they control, and views content the platform has already rendered to that user. FeedPilot does not ask for social media passwords, does not take custody of platform credentials, does not operate accounts from a remote server, and does not seek access to areas of a service that the user is not permitted to view.

That architecture matters for United States users. The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act is strongest when a tool breaks into systems, bypasses access gates, uses stolen credentials, or keeps accessing after authorization is clearly revoked. The Supreme Court's decision in Van Buren narrowed the "exceeds authorized access" argument when a person has access to the relevant information, and the Ninth Circuit's hiQ decisions rejected a broad CFAA claim for public web access. Those cases do not decide every logged-in feed scenario, but they support the core distinction FeedPilot is built around: user-authorized access is not the same thing as unauthorized intrusion.^[1][2]

The harder cases are not ignored. For instance, Facebook v. Power Ventures shows why cease-and-desist letters, explicit revocation, server-side account operation, and continued access after platform objection can change the legal risk profile. FeedPilot is structured away from that model: no password collection, no centralized login farm, no credential custody, no hidden scraping resale, and no attempt to defeat technical barriers.^[3]

2. Client-side modification is a legitimate category

The better analogy for FeedPilot is not a credential harvester or a scraping service. It is user-side control. Users have long changed how web pages appear and behave in their digital environment. Ad blockers, tracker blockers, reader modes, accessibility tools, parental controls, safety filters, News Feed Eradicator, Unhook, DF Tube, and similar extensions all reflect the same basic principle: once a platform renders content to a user, the user should have meaningful control over how that experience is presented, filtered, and navigated.

The ad-blocking cases are especially relevant because they concern software that changes the economic and visual experience intended by publishers. For instance, in 2018, Germany's Federal Court of Justice held that offering AdBlock Plus did not violate German unfair competition law. In 2025, the same court sent a narrower copyright question about ad-blocking back for further review, which is why the precedent is powerful but not a universal shield. The important point remains favorable to FeedPilot: client-side tools serving a user's preferences are not inherently unlawful merely because they reduce the platform's preferred form of engagement. ^[4][5]

3. Digital autonomy in the EU framework

FeedPilot is based in Europe and is designed around European data-protection and platform-governance values. The Digital Services Act requires recommender-system transparency and, for very large online platforms and search engines, at least one recommender option that is not based on profiling. The Digital Markets Act reinforces contestability and user choice around gatekeeper services. GDPR principles such as purpose limitation, data minimization, transparency, and user rights are also central to our design. ^[6][7][8]

FeedPilot does not claim those laws require every platform to permit every third-party browser tool in every circumstance. Our position is narrower and stronger: a user-side tool that helps a person understand, filter, and steer a feed rendered to them is consistent with the direction of European digital policy, especially when it is transparent, privacy-preserving, proportionate, and controlled by the user.

4. What FeedPilot does not do

• We do not request, store, or transmit social media passwords, cookies, or session tokens.
• We do not run your social account from a server or create a parallel account-control system.
• We do not sell attention data, build advertising profiles, or use your feed to target ads.
• We do not enable spam, harassment, deceptive impersonation, scraping for resale, or unlawful access.
• We do not automate follows, messages, comments, or other high-risk account actions.

5. The problem of asymmetric enforcement

Platforms may take a different view of tools that alter their preferred engagement loop. Their claims are more likely to sound in contract, interference with platform relationships, store-policy complaints, or anti-automation rules than in classic unauthorized-access claims. In browser-extension litigation involving Meta and BrandTotal, for example, the court record involved terms-of-use enforcement, Google store removal, and intentional-interference claims. That is the more realistic map of the risk than a simplistic unauthorized-access frame.^[9]

The practical risk is not limited to who would win a fully litigated case. A large platform may send a cease-and-desist letter, ban founder or user accounts, complain to an extension store, change the page interface so the tool breaks, or use the cost of litigation itself as leverage. Chrome Web Store terms give Google broad authority to prevent availability, remove listings, remotely disable products, or modify related materials when Google is notified or otherwise becomes aware and determines that certain legal, policy, or third-party-rights concerns exist. Chrome Web Store policy materials also describe store review and policy enforcement.^[10][11]

6. Our design posture

FeedPilot's strategic identity is digital autonomy in service of eudaimonia: a digital life that supports agency and long-run flourishing instead of compulsive engagement. The product is not designed to maximize time-on-platform, inflate metrics, farm engagement, or simulate a false audience. It is designed to help a person make the feed answer to their own stated purpose.

The core function is to read, classify, explain, filter, and move on from feed items according to the user's own goal. Any engagement signal is optional, transparent, permission-based, and subordinate to the user's chosen autonomy level. Engagement is a user-controlled signal only where the user chooses it and where it remains consistent with legitimate personal use.

7. Our commitments

• We will keep user control, explainability, and consent at the center of the product.
• We will prefer data minimization and local processing wherever feasible.
• We will avoid account-takeover patterns and server-side social account operation.
• We will maintain clear terms, privacy materials, and a data processing agreement.
• We will respond to platform or rights-holder concerns with narrow, technical, and lawful resolutions.
• We will maintain an enforcement-response posture, including entity hygiene, store-policy documentation, evidence preservation, and a clear response process for cease-and-desist or store complaints.

FeedPilot's position is that digital autonomy is not a loophole. It is the user's ordinary right to shape their own digital experience, using their own device, for their own legitimate purposes.

References

1. Van Buren v. United States, 593 U.S. 374 (2021). https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf/19-783_k53l.pdf
2. hiQ Labs, Inc. v. LinkedIn Corp., 31 F.4th 1180 (9th Cir. 2022). https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2022/04/18/17-16783.pdf
3. Facebook, Inc. v. Power Ventures, Inc., 844 F.3d 1058 (9th Cir. 2016). https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2016/12/09/13-17102.pdf
4. Bundesgerichtshof. (2018, April 19). Angebot des Werbeblockers AdBlock Plus nicht unlauter. https://juris.bundesgerichtshof.de/cgi-bin/rechtsprechung/document.py?Art=en&Datum=Aktuell&Gericht=bgh&linked=pm&nr=82856
5. Bundesgerichtshof. (2025, July 31). Urheberrechtliche Zulässigkeit eines Werbeblockers. https://www.bundesgerichtshof.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilungen/DE/2025/2025148.html
6. Regulation (EU) 2022/2065 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 19 October 2022 on a single market for digital services (Digital Services Act). Official Journal of the European Union. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2022/2065/oj/eng
7. Regulation (EU) 2022/1925 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 September 2022 on contestable and fair markets in the digital sector (Digital Markets Act). Official Journal of the European Union. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2022/1925/oj/eng
8. Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 (General Data Protection Regulation). Official Journal of the European Union. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:32016R0679
9. Meta Platforms, Inc. v. BrandTotal Ltd., No. 3:20-cv-07182, Document 344 (N.D. Cal. 2022). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/USCOURTS-cand-3_20-cv-07182/pdf/USCOURTS-cand-3_20-cv-07182-1.pdf
10. Google. (n.d.). Chrome Web Store Developer Agreement. Chrome for Developers. Retrieved 6 June 2026, from https://developer.chrome.com/docs/webstore/program-policies/terms
11. Google. (n.d.). Chrome Web Store Program Policies. Chrome for Developers. Retrieved 6 June 2026, from https://developer.chrome.com/docs/webstore/program-policies/policies