What Happens to Your Footage When You Upload It to an AI Video Tool
Before you upload a clip to an AI video tool, something happens that most people never think about: your footage leaves your machine and enters someone else’s infrastructure. What happens to it after that is written in a Terms of Service document that almost nobody reads.
We read them. Here’s what we found.
Descript
Descript’s ToS (last updated February 25, 2025) grants the company a broad license the moment you upload anything:
“You hereby grant to us a perpetual, irrevocable, nonexclusive, royalty-free, sublicensable, fully paid, worldwide license to create derivative works from, access, reproduce, distribute, process, publish, display, perform, adapt, modify, analyze, and otherwise use the User Content.”
That’s the standard content-hosting license, and it’s fairly typical. What’s more significant is what’s in Section 8.4(e):
“This includes use by Descript to train, improve, and develop its models and technologies (unless you have opted out of such use).”
Your footage can be used to train Descript’s AI unless you go into Settings → Profile → Share Data with Descript and turn it off. It’s opt-out, not opt-in. If you signed up and never changed that setting, your footage has been fair game.
There’s also a clause covering third-party AI providers: Descript uses subprocessors like OpenAI to power some features, and your inputs and outputs are shared with those providers, though Descript says it has agreements prohibiting them from training on your data.
Retention: Descript stores data “as long as necessary to carry out the purposes for which we originally collected it and for other legitimate business purposes.” No specific timeframe. Voiceprints (if you’ve used AI Speakers) are kept for up to three years after your last login.
How to limit it: Disable “Share Data with Descript” in your profile settings. This opts you out of AI training use. Your projects are still uploaded to Descript’s servers to function.
Runway
Runway’s language is the most direct of the three. From Section 4.4 of their ToS (last updated May 11, 2026):
“You acknowledge that Inputs and Outputs may be used by the Company to train and improve its AI models, algorithms and related technology, products and services (including for labeling, classification, content moderation and model training purposes). As such, you hereby grant to the Company a non-exclusive, irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide, royalty-free, fully paid, transferable, sublicensable right and license to use any Inputs and Outputs Made Available by you.”
Two words stand out: irrevocable and perpetual. Unlike Descript, there is no opt-out mechanism mentioned. Once you’ve used Runway and generated or uploaded content, that license cannot be revoked, even after you cancel your account.
Runway also collects biometric data:
“Biometric data, such as voice data and scans of faces that you submit when you use certain product features to create videos and audio.”
Face scans and voiceprints are retained for up to three years after your last interaction.
Retention: “As long as necessary to provide the Service and for other legitimate business purposes.”
How to limit it: As of the current ToS, there is no opt-out for the AI training license on inputs and outputs. Enterprise customers can negotiate different terms.
CapCut
CapCut, owned by ByteDance (the parent company of TikTok), updated its ToS in June 2025. The terms are the broadest of the three.
Under the updated terms, uploading to CapCut (including saving a draft to cloud backup) grants ByteDance:
- A worldwide, royalty-free, sublicensable, and transferable license to use, modify, distribute, monetize, and create derivative works from your content
- The right to use your name, face, voice, and likeness in sponsored content or promotions, without notification or compensation
- Permission to use your content for AI training, with no opt-out option reported
The terms reportedly apply even to content you later delete. The rights granted are perpetual and irrevocable.
There is an additional layer here that doesn’t apply to the other tools: ByteDance is a Chinese company subject to Chinese law, which can compel data sharing with the Chinese government. CapCut has been banned in India and scrutinized or restricted in other jurisdictions for this reason.
How to limit it: Using CapCut in fully offline mode (no cloud sync, no drafts saved to cloud) may avoid the server-side licensing. But this disables most of CapCut’s AI features, which is the reason most people use it.
The pattern across all three
None of these companies are doing anything unusual by tech industry standards. What they’re doing is standard practice: broad content licenses that cover training, improvement, and derivative use. The differences are in the details: whether there’s an opt-out, whether the rights survive account deletion, and who the data ultimately flows to.
The key questions to ask any tool before you upload footage:
- Is the license opt-out or opt-in for AI training? (Descript: opt-out. Runway: no opt-out. CapCut: no opt-out.)
- Does the license survive account deletion? (Runway and CapCut: yes. Descript: rights are limited to “Permitted Purposes” while using the service.)
- Who is the data shared with? (All three use third-party subprocessors. CapCut’s parent company is subject to Chinese law.)
- What biometric data is collected? (Runway and CapCut explicitly collect face geometry and voice data.)
Why local processing is a different category of answer
The questions above only matter if your footage leaves your machine. If processing happens on-device (transcription, search, quality scoring) then no Terms of Service governs your footage, because it never enters anyone else’s infrastructure.
That’s the premise behind PostSlate. Everything runs locally. Your footage is never uploaded to a server, which means there’s no license to read, no opt-out to configure, and no server-side retention period to worry about.
It also means PostSlate works without an internet connection, which is useful when you’re on set, on a plane, or cutting footage you’re contractually not supposed to share.
Related reads:
- Why Local Transcription Matters for Confidential Footage: what “upload your footage” actually means when you’re working under NDA.
- Organizing Footage Before You Import to Premiere, Resolve, or Final Cut: a workflow that keeps your footage off third-party servers from the start.
- The Best Footage Organization Software for Video Editors: how local-first tools compare to cloud-based alternatives.
PostSlate is currently pre-launch. Join the waitlist →