Court Finds Copyrighted Data Exempt Under FOIA
An Illinois appellate court recently held that real
property assessment data was exempt from disclosure under FOIA due to copyright
protections. In Garlick
v. Naperville Township, the requester sought an electronic copy of the
Township’s real property database, in its native file format. The
Township did not provide the copy, but directed the requester to its website
where he could search for the records by parcel. The requester sued,
arguing that the website did not provide him reasonable access to the
data.
The trial court ruled in favor of the Township, and Garlick appealed. On appeal, the court also ruled in favor of the Township, ruling that the requested data was exempt under FOIA because the Trade
Secrets Act and federal copyright laws prevented disclosure of the data in its
native format because the software vendor did not consent to the
disclosure. The court also noted that the Township had a contractual duty not to disclose
this information under the license agreement.
It is important for public entities to be aware of these
situations where copyright or contractual obligations may prevent disclosure of
records under FOIA.
Post Authored by Erin Pell, Ancel Glink
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