united-states is-x-legal
Am I free to use any publicly available data for visualization purposes?
<p><a href="https://lib.guides.umd.edu/c.php?g=949738&amp;p=6875875" rel="nofollow noreferrer">According to this page</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Data itself is not copyrightable.</p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p>For instance, demographic counts, weather measurements, phone numbers, chemical structures, currency values, facts about individuals and events, and similar types of factual information may be used without permission.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>From this, it seems like any type of publicly available data can be used to create visualizations, even without asking for permission. Is that true?</p>

<p>You are correct that facts in general are not protected by copyright, and most raw data are facts.</p>
<p>However, a collection of data may be protected by copyright as to its selection and organization. A use which copies such selection might possibly be copyright infringement.</p>
<p>If data constitutes a trade secret it may be protected as such, and &quot;improper&quot; access might be unlawful.  This would not apply to publicly available data or collections of  data.</p>
<p>If, to access a data set, one must sign or agree to a contract, that contract may limit the use of such data. Again, this would not apply to most publicly available data.</p>

<h1>Yes and no</h1>
<p>Your list of items is generally facts which may be used without anything attached, but some facts are different:</p>
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<p>phone numbers</p>
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<p>Phone numbers are <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/2/200.79" rel="nofollow noreferrer">PII - personally identifying information</a> - and you are possibly limited in what you may do with such PII. It also doesn't matter where you are, but where the data subject is to get you in trouble:</p>
<p>If the Data subject even is in the EU, you might be banned from processing the PII without permission of the data subject or be in violation of <a href="/questions/tagged/gdpr" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;gdpr&#39;" rel="tag">gdpr</a>.</p>
