AI Usage Policy Template for Content Teams

TL;DR

A paste-ready 10-clause AI usage policy for content teams, each clause tied to the rule behind it - the AI Act's editorial-responsibility exemption, NIST's govern functions, Google's spam test and FTC substantiation.

The policy below is ten clauses, and it is on this page rather than behind a form. Each clause exists because a rule, a regulation or a framework function asks for it, and each is labelled with the source, so you can argue any clause with your legal team on the evidence rather than on taste. The load-bearing one is clause 7: the EU AI Act's disclosure duty for AI-generated text falls away only where a named person holds editorial responsibility for the publication.

Written against Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 as published in the Official Journal, the NIST AI Risk Management Framework 1.0 and its Generative AI Profile, Google Search Central's spam and helpful-content documentation, and FTC advertising rules, all retrieved 2026-09-18. It is a starting point, not legal advice, and adopting it achieves nothing on its own.

Key Takeaways

Named editorial responsibility is a legal hinge, not a nicety. The AI Act requires deployers publishing AI-generated text on matters of public interest to disclose it, "unless the AI-generated content has undergone a process of human review or editorial control and a natural or legal person holds editorial responsibility for the publication of the content" (Regulation (EU) 2024/1689, Article 50(4), retrieved 2026-09-18).

The AI Act's transparency rules are already live. The Commission states "the transparency rules of the AI Act will come into effect in August 2026", while the high-risk deadlines moved to 2 December 2027 and 2 August 2028 (European Commission, regulatory framework for AI, retrieved 2026-09-18).

A policy banning AI writing is aimed at the wrong target. Google's spam policy defines scaled content abuse as mass low-value pages "no matter how it's created" (Google Search Central, spam policies, last updated 2026-08-28, retrieved 2026-09-18).

Verification belongs in the policy, because the framework puts it there. NIST's Generative AI Profile lists the action: "Review and verify sources and citations in GAI system outputs during pre-deployment risk measurement and ongoing monitoring activities" (NIST AI 600-1, MS-2.5-003, retrieved 2026-09-18).

A marketing claim needs evidence before it publishes, whoever drafted it. "Offering a money-back guarantee is not a substitute for substantiation" (FTC, Advertising FAQs, retrieved 2026-09-18).

Writing the policy is the easy half. NIST says plainly that "Use of the AI RMF alone will not lead to these changes or provide the appropriate incentives" (NIST AI 100-1, retrieved 2026-09-18).

What a content-team policy actually has to do

Three obligations already apply to a team publishing AI-assisted content, and a policy is how you discharge them in a way you can show someone later.

Transparency, under the AI Act. Article 50(4) puts a disclosure duty on deployers who publish AI-generated or manipulated text "with the purpose of informing the public on matters of public interest", with the editorial-responsibility exemption quoted above. Whether a given blog post is "informing the public on matters of public interest" is a judgement your counsel makes about your content, not one this post can make for you (ANALYSIS). The separate duty to mark outputs "in a machine-readable format and detectable as artificially generated or manipulated" sits on providers of the AI system under Article 50(2), which is your vendor, not your marketing team (retrieved 2026-09-18, SOURCED).

Search quality, under Google's documentation. Google does not penalise AI writing as such. Its spam policy defines scaled content abuse as "when many pages are generated for the primary purpose of manipulating search rankings and not helping users", including "using generative AI tools or other similar tools to generate many pages without adding value for users", and says the practice is abusive "no matter how it's created". Its helpful-content guidance asks: "Is the use of automation, including AI-generation, self-evident to visitors through disclosures or in other ways?" and states that "AI or automation disclosures are useful for content where someone might think" how it was created (Google Search Central, creating helpful content, retrieved 2026-09-18, SOURCED). A policy that forbids the tool and ignores the value test is optimising against the wrong sentence. The detection question is covered separately in Google does not detect AI rewording.

Accuracy and accountability, under NIST. The AI RMF asks that "legal and regulatory requirements involving AI are understood, managed, and documented" (GOVERN 1.1) and that "policies and procedures are in place to define and differentiate roles and responsibilities for human-AI configurations and oversight of AI systems" (GOVERN 3.2). Its Generative AI Profile names the specific failure this cluster keeps returning to: confabulations, where models "produce outputs that are factually inaccurate or internally inconsistent" and "risks from confabulations may arise when users believe false content - often due to the confident nature of the response" (NIST AI 600-1, retrieved 2026-09-18, SOURCED).

The template

Copy this into your own document. Replace anything in square brackets. Delete clauses that do not apply to your team, and keep the source note beside each one so a reviewer can check it rather than take your word.

# [Company] AI Usage Policy - Content Team Version 1.0 · Effective [date] · Owner: [name, role] · Next review: [date] ## 1. Scope and definitions This policy covers all content published under [Company]'s name or on its domains, in any language, where a generative AI tool contributed to research, drafting, editing, translation, summarisation or image creation. "AI assistance" means any use of a generative model, whether through a chat interface, an API, a browser extension or a feature embedded in another tool. "Publication" means any external release, including web pages, email, ads, social posts, documentation and sales collateral. Everyone in scope: [teams, contractors, agencies, freelancers]. ## 2. Permitted uses AI assistance is permitted for: research summarisation, outlining, drafting, rewriting for length or reading level, translation drafts, alt-text drafts, metadata drafts, code samples in technical posts, and ideation. ## 3. Prohibited uses The following are prohibited outright: - Publishing a statistic, quotation, date, price, product name, legal reference or URL that a model produced and no person verified at its source. - Generating pages at volume whose purpose is search ranking rather than reader value. - Creating a review, testimonial or endorsement that a named real person did not give. - Describing first-hand research, testing or measurement that did not happen. - Stating or implying a regulatory, medical, legal, financial or safety outcome that the evidence in hand does not support. - Pasting the material listed in clause 8 into any third-party tool. ## 4. Verification before publication No AI-assisted content publishes until a named person has: - opened every cited source and confirmed the claim appears there; - confirmed every named product, price and feature against the vendor's own page on the day of publication; - counted list items against the title and the introduction; - resolved every outbound link and checked the anchor text describes the destination; - confirmed no tracking or affiliate parameter is attached to any URL. The operational checklist for this clause is [linked internal checklist]. Verification is recorded per clause 9, not asserted. ## 5. Sources and citations Every load-bearing claim carries an inline citation to a source the reader can open, with a retrieval date. Claims that cannot be sourced are cut or are published with the uncertainty stated in the text. Model output is never a source, and neither is a summary of a source the writer did not open. Where a figure or a feature is contested or unverifiable, the post says so. ## 6. Disclosure of AI assistance Published content states whether AI assisted its production, in a place a reader will find it. The standing wording is: [one sentence, e.g. "AI assisted the drafting of this article. Every source was verified by a named editor."] Disclosure is mandatory where the content informs the public on a matter of public interest, and is our default everywhere else. ## 7. Human accountability Every published item has one named accountable person, recorded before publication. That person holds editorial responsibility for the item, including for anything a model contributed to it. Accountability may not be assigned to a team, a tool, a vendor or a process. ## 8. Confidentiality The following must never be entered into a third-party AI tool that is not covered by a written agreement permitting it: customer personal data, employee personal data, credentials and API keys, unreleased financial figures, unreleased product plans, material under NDA, source code where the licence forbids it, and any document marked [internal classification]. When in doubt, ask [role] before pasting. ## 9. Records For each published item, record: the accountable person, the date, which tools and model versions assisted, what was verified and by whom, and any claim that was cut for lack of a source. Retain for [period]. ## 10. Review, training and breach

This policy is reviewed every [six months] by [role], and on any change to the rules it cites. New joiners and new contractors read it before their first publication. A breach is reported to [role]; a published error is corrected in place with a note, not quietly edited.

Why clause 7 is the one to keep

If you cut nine clauses, keep the named accountable person.

The AI Act's second subparagraph of Article 50(4) makes the disclosure duty for AI-generated public-interest text conditional, and the condition is human: a "process of human review or editorial control" and "a natural or legal person holds editorial responsibility for the publication of the content" (retrieved 2026-09-18, SOURCED). A team with no named owner per item cannot demonstrate either half.

The same clause does the work in the other two regimes. Google's guidance asks whether it is "self-evident to your visitors who authored your content". The FTC's endorsement guides state that "your company is ultimately responsible for what others do on your behalf" (FTC, endorsement guides FAQ, retrieved 2026-09-18, SOURCED) - and a model drafting your ad copy is something acting on your behalf (ANALYSIS). NIST asks for roles that are defined and differentiated rather than diffuse.

One name per item is also the cheapest clause to enforce, because it is a single field in whatever tool you already use (ANALYSIS).

The clauses that keep you out of advertising trouble

Clauses 3 and 4 exist because the FTC's rules bite regardless of who typed the sentence.

Substantiation comes first. The FTC states that in most cases, ads making health or safety claims "must be supported by" what it calls "competent and reliable scientific evidence" - which it describes as "tests, studies, or other scientific evidence that has been evaluated by people qualified to review it" - and that letters from satisfied customers are not sufficient to substantiate a claim (FTC Advertising FAQs, retrieved 2026-09-18, SOURCED). The FTC also confirms it will not pre-clear your ads: "FTC staff cannot clear your ads in advance."

A model-written testimonial is a violation on its face. The rule makes it "an unfair or deceptive act or practice" for a business "to write, create, or sell a consumer review, consumer testimonial, or celebrity testimonial that materially misrepresents, expressly or by implication", where the first listed misrepresentation is "That the reviewer or testimonialist exists" (16 CFR 465.2(a)(1), retrieved 2026-09-18, SOURCED). No disclosure fixes an invented endorser.

The claim-by-claim detail for ads sits in 10 ad copy claims AI writes that you legally cannot publish, and for product pages in 9 AI product description mistakes.

What this policy cannot do

State these limits when you circulate it, because a policy oversold is a policy nobody trusts the second time.

It does not deliver a regulatory outcome. No internal document makes you compliant with the AI Act, the FTC Act or anything else, and any vendor or template promising that is overclaiming.
It does not make model output accurate. It makes an unverified claim somebody's named responsibility before it reaches a reader.
It does not survive being written and filed. NIST is blunt: "Organizations need to establish and maintain the appropriate accountability mechanisms, roles and responsibilities, culture, and incentive structures for risk management to be effective. Use of the AI RMF alone will not lead to these changes or provide the appropriate incentives" (NIST AI 100-1, retrieved 2026-09-18, SOURCED).
It does not settle whether your content is "public interest" under Article 50(4). That is a legal reading of your specific content.

What one unverified fact costs when it does reach a reader is documented, case by case, in what one wrong fact actually costs.

Adopting it, and the review cadence

The AI RMF asks that "ongoing monitoring and periodic review of the risk management process and its outcomes are planned and organizational roles and responsibilities clearly defined, including determining the frequency of periodic review" (GOVERN 1.5, retrieved 2026-09-18, SOURCED). The Generative AI Profile is more specific for content: "Define organizational responsibilities for periodic review of content provenance and incident monitoring for GAI systems" (GV-1.5-001, retrieved 2026-09-18, SOURCED).

A cadence that works in practice (ANALYSIS):

Name the owner and the review date in the header before you circulate it. A policy with no owner has already failed clause 7.
Review on the calendar and on the trigger. Every six months, plus any time a rule it cites changes. The dates in this post are an example of why: the AI Act's high-risk deadlines moved to 2 December 2027 and 2 August 2028 after the amendment package the Commission calls the AI Omnibus entered into force on 27 July 2026, so any policy citing the original Article 113 timetable is now out of date.
Verify your model facts on a shorter clock than your policy. Model names, context windows and cutoffs change on a scale of weeks.
Test the tools you rely on before you write them into clause 2. The method is in the 10-prompt AI accuracy test, and the questions to ask a vendor are in 8 accuracy questions to ask any AI vendor.
Do not write an AI-detector requirement into clause 4. What detectors can and cannot establish is covered in do AI detectors actually work; a clause that depends on one is a clause that fails on appeal.

For the wider framework landscape, see 8 AI trustworthiness frameworks. Note that its EU AI Act dates predate the amendment described above.

How This Guide Was Sourced

Written and maintained by the LogicBalls editorial team (logicballs.com). Disclosure: LogicBalls builds AI writing tools. A policy like this one constrains our own product's output as much as anyone else's, and clause 3's first bullet is the constraint we would most like customers to apply to us.

AI involvement. AI assisted the research and drafting of this article. Every quotation, article number and framework identifier below was opened at its source and matched against the text on 2026-09-18, and every link was resolved on that date. Those checks were performed by AI, not by a person reading behind it. Editorial responsibility for this page rests with the LogicBalls editorial team.

Sources. Regulation (EU) 2024/1689, Article 50, as published in the Official Journal via EUR-Lex; the European Commission's regulatory-framework page for application dates; NIST AI 100-1 (AI RMF 1.0) GOVERN 1.1, 1.4, 1.5, 3.2 and 4.2; NIST AI 600-1 (Generative AI Profile) actions GV-1.2-001, GV-1.5-001, MS-2.5-003 and MS-2.10-001; Google Search Central's spam policies (last updated 2026-08-28) and creating-helpful-content guidance; the FTC's Advertising FAQs, endorsement guides FAQ, and 16 CFR 465.2.

What could not be verified. The AI Omnibus amending instrument itself was not read, and no consolidated version of Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 was retrievable, so the revised high-risk dates are sourced to the Commission's own page rather than to the amending text. Article 50 was read in full in the Official Journal text on 2026-09-18; EUR-Lex then began answering repeated automated requests with HTTP 202 rather than the document, so the link above may appear broken to a link checker while serving normally in a browser. ISO/IEC 42001 is paywalled - iso.org returns HTTP 403 to an automated request - so this post names no ISO requirement and makes no claim about its contents. Nothing here is sourced to OpenAI material, whose help centre returns HTTP 403.

What is not claimed. No figure for how many teams have a policy, no measurement of how much a policy reduces published errors, and no legal opinion on whether your content falls within Article 50(4). This is not legal advice. Have your counsel read any clause you intend to rely on.

No LogicBalls telemetry is used in this guide. Every figure above is external and linked.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do we legally have to disclose that AI helped write a blog post?

It depends on the content and where you publish. The AI Act requires disclosure for AI-generated text "published with the purpose of informing the public on matters of public interest", unless the content had human review or editorial control and a named person holds editorial responsibility. Google separately treats disclosure as useful where a reader might wonder how something was made. Ask your counsel where your content sits; clause 6 defaults to disclosing.

Will a policy protect us if a published post turns out to be wrong?

Not by itself. It gives you a named owner, a record of what was verified, and a correction route - which is the difference between an error and an unexplained error. The consequences that actually landed on other organisations are documented case by case in our post on what one wrong fact costs.

Should the policy ban AI-written content outright?

Google's own documentation argues against framing it that way: the spam policy targets mass low-value pages "no matter how it's created". A ban on the tool is hard to enforce and misses the pages that actually cause the problem. Clause 3 bans the outcomes instead.

Who should own this policy?

One named person with authority to stop a publication. Ownership by a committee fails the same test clause 7 exists to pass.

How often should we review it?

Every six months, and on any change to a rule it cites. The AI Act's own high-risk dates moved in 2026, which is the argument for a trigger-based review rather than an annual one.

Can we use this template as-is?

You can copy it, and you should not publish it unread. Delete what does not apply, fill in every bracket, and have counsel review clauses 6, 7 and 8 against your jurisdiction and your contracts.