Copyright Management System

Scribd thrives on the diverse contributions of its community, who share everything from short stories and recipes to original music compositions.

We make it very clear, however, that we do not want unauthorized works on our site. To help prevent the upload of unauthorized works onto Scribd, we have created the Scribd Copyright Management System (CMS), a technology and set of best practices. Scribd CMS is the best—if not the only—integrated system of technology and policies of its kind and goes beyond the requirements set forth by U.S., UK and EU law.

Here’s how it works:

• All uploads checked: Every document uploaded to Scribd is compared to the CMS database. If someone tries to upload a document that our system identifies as one of the tens of thousands of works in our CMS database (with more added daily), that document is automatically removed from Scribd.
• How we populate the database:
  • Automated past protection: Each time Scribd receives a DMCA-compliant takedown request from a copyright holder, we quickly remove the unauthorized document and add a unique reference file corresponding to that document to our copyright database, deleting previously-uploaded copies of the same work identified by the system.
  • Automated future protection: We also urge authors and publishers to proactively add the text of their work to the Scribd CMS. Click here to upload your original works to the copyright management system.
  • Swift action for policy offenders: On every document upload page, there is a prominent warning message and mandatory check box displayed to help ensure that people understand and comply with Scribd’s Terms of Service. Repeat copyright infringers are banned from Scribd.
  • Alliance of websites: Our goal is to help extend the same protections copyright holders have on Scribd across a number of different sites. With that in mind, Scribd is prepared to share its copyright-management technology with other document-sharing websites that are interested in preventing uploads of unauthorized material.

More to come, stay tuned!

While the technology is not yet perfect, we are constantly working to improve it. As our reference database grows larger over time, our system is becoming noticeably smarter and faster. We will continue to build features and best practices that give copyright holders more choice and control over how their works appear, if at all, on Scribd.