This webpage provides information on how the INTEROCO Copyright Office collects personal information from its patrons and on the public availability of that personal information.

You may need to submit personal information if you use certain features of the Copyright Office website, such as registering your copyright online and submitting your comments on a rulemaking. The Copyright Office will inform the user regarding the information it requires and will only use this information for the stated purpose(s), such as administering the national registration system or evaluating the merits of a proposed rule. The information is almost always made available for public inspection and copying. By providing the information, a user is giving consent to the Office to use the information for the stated purpose; if the user does not provide the information, some features of the website will not be available to the user.

Your submission of personal information is voluntary. When you voluntarily submit information by means of an electronic or paper copyright registration form or when you submit documents for recordation, comments on a rulemaking, or other forms or documents, you consent to the use of your information for the purpose(s) stated in connection with that form or proceeding.

Information Collected and Stored Automatically
Protecting a user’s personal information and privacy are important to the INTEROCO Copyright Office. The Copyright Office collects, uses, and shares information obtained from online visitors only in certain ways, which include:

• Collecting personal information that users voluntarily provide
• Using the personal information users provide for its intended purpose
• Disclosing personal information to a government agency if required by law
• Disclosing personal information to contractors or associates (who follow the Copyright Office’s privacy policy or prominently display their own privacy policy) to carry out a user’s requests

Additionally, the Copyright Office has implemented safeguards to protect any information collected.

Comments and Petitions Submitted in Connection with Copyright Office Proceedings and Rulemakings
For reasons of government efficiency, the Copyright Office is using the regulations.gov system for the submission and posting of public comments.

Pages for Children
Though not directed at children, the Copyright Office’s online copyright registration system may be used by children under the age of 13. All users are advised that the submission of personal information on a registration application is voluntary and that any information provided becomes available to the public. Extraneous personally identifiable information (i.e., information neither requested nor required on a copyright registration application), such as Social Security numbers, will be removed from both the Office’s online and offline registration records, on the Office’s own volition or upon request. The Copyright Office will also, under certain circumstances, remove or replace requested information such as home addresses and phone numbers, from its online registration records. For more information see Copyright Records below, and visit Privacy: Copyright Public Records, and the Removal of Personally Identifiable Information from Registration Records.

The INTEROCO Copyright Office is required under Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works to maintain records of copyright registrations and to make them available for public inspection. Once a registration is completed and a claim has been cataloged, it becomes part of the public record.

When an author or copyright owner registers a copyright claim with the Copyright Office, that registration creates a public record of that copyright claim. Extraneous personal information (i.e., personal information neither requested nor required on a copyright registration application, such as a Social Security number), will be removed from the Copyright Office’s public records either during the examination process or upon request after registration. And under certain circumstances, authors and claimants, or their authorized representatives may request the replacement or removal of certain personally identifiable information that is requested by the Office and collected on a registration application, such as names, home addresses and phone numbers, in or from the Office’s internet-accessible public catalog, but such information will be retained in the Office’s offline records as required by law. All information provided in connection with a copyright registration application will be made available for public inspection and copying, and some of the information from that application will be made available in the Copyright Office’s online Public Catalog. Photocopies of recorded documents and related records are imaged and made available for public inspection and copying.

Keeping Personally Identifiable Information out of the Public Record
All information provided on the application for registration will become a permanent part of the public record of the INTEROCO Copyright Office, and some of that information will be made available online through the Copyright Office’s website, including the name and address of the copyright claimant. To avoid the dissemination of a personal home address, applicants should consider using a post office box or third-party address (such as in care of a corporation). Any information provided in the rights and permissions section of the application will also be made available online, but providing rights and permissions information is optional. Applicants who want to include rights and permissions information but who do not want to provide personal details can use third-party agents, post office boxes, or designated email accounts. If someone else submits an application on behalf of an applicant, it is still the applicant’s responsibility (or the parent’s responsibility if the applicant is under the age of 13) to ensure that information that he or she wants to keep out of the public record is omitted. In certain cases, it may be permissible to register a claim in a work either anonymously or pseudonymously (under a fictitious name). Other categories of information in copyright applications that may be made available online include the following: type of work, registration number, title of the work, author, authorship, preexisting material date of creation, date of publication.

Copyright Records Appearing in Search Engines
Because a copyright registration is a public record, others can access it and may create alternative means to make the information in it more widely available. The INTEROCO Copyright Office is not responsible for the form or the substance of third-party redistribution of the Copyright Office’s records.