Data Licensing

Data Licensing in OCS

Why data licensing? Simply stating that data is in the public domain is not good enough for many users. A data license is needed to provide assurance to users in how they may use the data, which expands access of our data to a much wider user base. This aligns the Office of Coast Survey with NOAA's Data Strategy, to maximize usage of federal government data. Furthermore, the machine-readable data license eases and standardizes our handling of data into the National Bathymetric Source, which was built to maintain the license and improves communication to the users downstream.

Coast Survey adopted the well-known and internationally recognized licenses from Creative Commons. All data acquired by Coast Survey is formally dedicated to the public domain via the Creative Commons 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication (CC0-1.0), which removes all copyright from the data so that it may be used by anyone, for any purpose. This license ensures maximum use of our data, to spur and encourage exploration and innovation throughout the industry.

In order to achieve our national and global mapping objectives, the data acquired by Coast Survey is not enough. Collaboration with our external mapping partners in government, industry, and academia is essential to meeting those goals. However, the data contributed from external sources may have restrictions. If the external data is not already licensed, the provider may assign a data license onto their data prior to contributing to Coast Survey, to define any terms of use.

We encourage external data contributors to assign CC0-1.0 onto their data, which ensures maximum usage of the data throughout the industry, for anyone’s use and for any purpose. An alternative option is the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC-BY-4.0). Under this license, the data may be used by anyone, for any purpose, however the user is legally obligated to provide credit (i.e. attribution) to the provider when using the data in its original form. Please note, however, that it is a community norm to always cite the original data provider, regardless of the license. In other words, use of CC0-1.0 does not exempt users from following such community norms to provide credit to the original data providers. In fact, CC0-1.0 remains the preferred license for data contributors who wish to achieve both maximum data usage and data citation. Because it is completely free of legal barriers, data licensed with CC0-1.0 is most easily used and reused, with continued data citation at each step along the way.

Finally, for external contributors that do not want their data to be publicly released, there is an Internal Use Only license option. Data under this license will not be distributed, nor will it be used for any products, such as charts, models, and precision marine navigation. It will be used for survey planning and internal modeling only.

The full license terms are given below. For external data contributors with more nuanced data restrictions, they are encouraged to contact the Coast Survey External Source Data team at esd.team@noaa.gov.

Full License Terms

Creative Commons 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication (CC0-1.0)
Provider is, voluntarily and without financial compensation, providing gridded bathymetric data to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) under a Creative Commons 1.0 Universal public domain dedication (CC0-1.0).

NOAA intends to register and integrate Provider's Data into the Office of Coast Survey source database, and merge it with other datasets to create products derived from the database. More specifically, NOAA use of Provider's Data may include, but is not limited to, creating electronic navigational charts, mesh generated products for marine modeling (flooding models, tsunami inundation, VDATUM water level models, for example), and precision navigation products (S-102); hydrographic survey planning; and hydrographic data gap analysis for Seabed 2030 initiatives. NOAA products, including those created in whole or in part with the Provider's Data, will be publicly released with no restrictions on their use.

Furthermore, NOAA intends to publicly release the Provider's Data in its original form under the same CC0-1.0 public domain dedication (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/?ref=chooser-v1). However, in no event is NOAA liable to the Provider for third party use of Provider Data or products NOAA derives using Provider Data.

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC-BY-4.0)
Provider is, voluntarily and without financial compensation, providing gridded bathymetric data to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC-BY-4.0).

NOAA intends to register and integrate Provider's Data into the Office of Coast Survey's source database, and merge it with other datasets to create products derived from the database. More specifically, NOAA use of Provider's Data may include, but is not limited to, creating electronic navigational charts, mesh generated products for marine modeling (flooding models, tsunami inundation, VDATUM water level models, for example), and precision navigation products (S-102); hydrographic survey planning; and hydrographic data gap analysis for Seabed 2030 initiatives. NOAA products, including those created in whole or in part with the Provider's Data, will be publicly released with no restrictions on their use.

Furthermore, NOAA intends to publicly release the Provider's Data in its original form under the CC-BY-4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/?ref=chooser-v1) License, and will give credit to the Provider. However, in no event is NOAA liable to the Provider for third party use of Provider Data or products NOAA derives using Provider Data.

Internal Use Only
Provider is, voluntarily and without financial compensation, providing gridded bathymetric data to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The data will be for internal use only by NOAA and its contractors and affiliates, to the extent permitted under Federal laws and regulations.

NOAA will not integrate Provider's Data into the Office of Coast Survey's source database, nor will NOAA create any derivative products, for example, merging with other datasets to create products derived from the database, such as electronic navigational charts, mesh generated products for marine modeling (flooding models, tsunami inundation, VDATUM water level models, for example), and precision navigation products (S-102). The Provider's Data will be used for internal NOAA purposes, including hydrographic survey planning, and hydrographic data gap analysis for Seabed 2030 initiatives.