Copyright Office opens tenth DMCA rulemaking, sets Aug. 24 petition deadline
The U.S. Copyright Office has opened its tenth triennial rulemaking under Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, starting a federal process that will consider which lawful activities may receive exemptions from technological access controls on copyrighted works.
The office announced the proceeding on July 9, 2026. It is asking the public to submit petitions proposing new exemptions or seeking renewal of exemptions from the ninth triennial proceeding. Petitions are due Aug. 24, 2026.
The opening of the rulemaking does not approve any new exemption. It also does not establish the outcome of any petition. The final exemptions, as well as their effective dates, will be determined later in the administrative process.
What the proceeding covers
Section 1201 exemptions concern the circumvention of technological measures that control access to copyrighted works. In practical terms, the rulemaking addresses circumstances in which a person or organization may be allowed to get around an access control for a lawful purpose.
The process is relevant to libraries, archives, researchers, educators, accessibility advocates, security researchers, technology developers and other users whose activities may require access to protected works. The proceeding therefore reaches beyond copyright holders and technology companies. It also involves institutions and individuals that may need to preserve, study, teach from or otherwise lawfully use protected material.
Those groups are not automatically exempt from Section 1201 restrictions simply because they are libraries, archives, researchers or educators. Whether a particular activity qualifies depends on the exemptions established through the rulemaking process.
New and renewed petitions
The Copyright Office’s notice seeks two broad types of requests: petitions for new exemptions and petitions to renew exemptions adopted during the ninth triennial proceeding. The distinction matters because a petition is a proposal for consideration, not a final authorization.
Organizations and individuals that believe a lawful activity should be covered in the next cycle must submit their petitions by the Aug. 24 deadline. The approved source material does not identify which specific exemptions will be proposed, so the opening notice alone does not show whether any particular use, technology or community will ultimately receive a new or renewed exemption.
The tenth proceeding is a formal federal copyright-policy process, rather than a private industry announcement or a completed change to copyright law itself. Its purpose is to evaluate possible exemptions under Section 1201. The announcement marks the beginning of that evaluation, not its conclusion.
What happens next
The immediate next step is the submission of petitions by Aug. 24, 2026. After that deadline, the rulemaking will continue toward decisions on the requests. The final exemptions and their effective dates will be set later, and the current notice does not provide an outcome for any petition.
For people and institutions that rely on lawful access to protected works, the key date is therefore the petition deadline rather than an immediate change in what they may do. Existing rules and exemptions are not replaced by the announcement alone. Any new or renewed permission will depend on the later results of the federal process.
The proceeding gives libraries, archives, researchers, educators, accessibility advocates, security researchers, technology developers and other affected users a defined opportunity to ask for exemptions or seek continuation of exemptions from the prior cycle. Until the process is completed, however, the scope of the next set of exemptions remains unsettled.
Sources
- NewsNet Issue 1088, U.S. Copyright Office
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