University of Arizona Libraries copyright take-down request policy

The UA Libraries makes digital versions of materials available for the purposes of education and scholarly use. These materials include content from our archival and special collections, scholarly output from the campus community, and hosted digital projects produced by partners external to the Libraries.

The Libraries make every effort to ensure that it has appropriate rights to provide access to this content in compliance with U.S. Copyright law. We are responsible for the rights review and assignment for materials held and/or stewarded by the Libraries. Rights review of materials produced by external partners is the responsibility of those external partners, who are asked to warrant that the digital materials made available on UA Libraries digital collections websites:

  • Do not infringe on the intellectual property rights of any person or entity
  • Do not infringe on the rights of privacy of others.

In some cases, copyright status may be difficult or impossible to determine. The following guidelines describe the process for addressing take-down and withdrawal requests for digital content made available by the University of Arizona Libraries.

General

All digital exhibits, projects, and collection websites will contain a link to, or the text of, the process by which users can request or inquire about removal of digital material they believe is infringing their copyright. The user instructions will ask for the requestor’s:

  • Contact information (email address and phone number);
  • Indication of whether they are making the request on behalf of themselves or in their role as an agent for the copyright holder;
  • URL of the digital content;
  • Reason why they believe the digital content violates intellectual property or privacy rights;
  • Statements attesting that the requestor is acting in good faith and the information is accurate.

If you cannot find information about how to request removal of digital materials from one of the Libraries’ websites, please submit your request (with the above information) to the Libraries’ .

Upon receipt of a take-down request, the UA Libraries staff will:

  • Acknowledge receipt of the request;
  • Begin an assessment of the validity of the request;
  • Make a determination of the validity of the request, resulting in:
    • Removal of the online content;
    • Restriction of access to the online content;
    • Continued public access to the online material;
  • Communicate that action to the requestor.

In cases of a take-down request for digital materials in a hosted digital project, we will contact the external partner who originally conducted the rights review to:

  • Alert them of the take-down request;
  • Coordinate a joint review of the request and the intellectual property rights status of the contested materials.

UA Libraries staff may suspend access to contested digital content immediately upon receipt of a take-down request depending upon the nature and urgency of the request.

Digital “Tombstones”

Metadata regarding retracted materials (digital “tombstones”) will remain online and available for content once available in the UA repositories (Campus Repository and ReDATA) and hosted journals. Some digital platforms used to host UA archival/special collections and hosted digital projects materials may not provide options for retention of publicly accessible metadata and description of retracted items. When feasible, digital tombstones will be used to indicate where content has been removed.

Request Procedures

Procedures for requesting removal of content from the UA repositories are available on the repository websites. The UA Campus Repository withdrawal policy and procedure is included in the About page of the repository website. The UA Research Data Repository Policies include specific information about removal of published datasets.

The process for consideration and removal of journal articles published or hosted by the UA Libraries will follow specific retraction guidelines adopted by the Libraries’ journal publishing partner (the specific journal) or the Retraction Guidelines developed by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). Notice of retraction will be clearly indicated on the journal’s website. A tombstone page will remain on the journal’s website indicating the removal of previously published content.

The UA Libraries provides access to website hosting platforms for some digital collections through third parties such as Reclaim Hosting and Pressbooks. If you would like to request removal of digital materials from one of these websites, you can submit a request directly to the content owner (the Libraries’ external partner) or to the UA Libraries’ Scholarly Communication Librarian. Your request to take-down material should include the following:

  • Contact information (email address and phone number);
  • Indication of whether they are making the request on behalf of themselves or in their role as an agent for the copyright holder;
  • URL of the digital content;
  • Reason why they believe the digital content violates intellectual property or privacy rights;
  • Statements attesting that the requestor is acting in good faith and the information is accurate.

The UA Libraries will work with its external partners using these third-party platforms to jointly review the request and the intellectual property rights status of the contested materials.

DMCA Notices

Any reports alleging copyright infringement on other University of Arizona website locations or networks in accordance with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) should be made according to the procedures outlined on the UA Copyright webpage.

Last revised: December 12, 2022