1510.1 Deposit Storage
Section 704 (A) of the Copyright Act states that “[u]pon their deposit in the Copyright Office under Sections 407 and 408, all copies, phonorecords, and identifying material, including those deposited in connection with claims that have been refused registration, are the property of the United States Government.” 17 U.S.C. § 704 (A).
Unpublished and published deposit materials that are submitted to the U.S. Copyright Office in a hard copy format are stored in offsite storage facilities, unless the deposit copy(ies) are selected by the Library of Congress for its collections or unless the deposit has been returned to the applicant under the Motion Picture Agreement. Unpublished deposit materials are stored for the entire term of copyright. Published deposit materials are currently stored for twenty years.
When the Office closes a file for a published or unpublished work without issuing a registration or refuses to register a work, the deposit materials are stored in accordance with the Office’s retention schedule.
See generally Simplifying Deposit Requirements for Certain Literary Works and Musical Compositions, 82 Fed. Reg. 38,859 (Aug. 16, 2017).