1805 Removal of Personally Identifiable Information
The U.S. Copyright Office may collect certain personally identifiable information (PII) as part of the copyright registration application, including home addresses, personal telephone and fax numbers, and personal email addresses. This information may be included in the online public record maintained by the Office.
In general, an author, claimant of record, or the authorized representative of the author or claimant of record may submit a request to remove or replace certain information in the online public record. This procedure only applies to PII that is requested by the Office as part of the registration process. For information about the Office’s policy for handling extraneous PII, such as driver’s license numbers, social security numbers, banking information, or credit card information, see Section 1804.
A properly submitted request will be reviewed by the Associate Register of Copyrights and Director of the Office of Public Information and Education to determine whether the request should be granted or denied. The Office’s decision to grant or deny the request will be made in writing and will be sent to the address indicated in the request.
If the request is granted, the Office will remove the information from the online public record. Where substitute information is required and has been provided, the Office will add that information to the online public record. In addition, the Office will add a note indicating that the online record has been modified, and will issue a new certificate of registration that reflects the modified information. The Office will maintain a copy of the original registration record in its offline records.
If a request to remove PII is denied, the requesting party may request reconsideration using the procedure described in Section 1805.4.