About LumenLumen is an independent research project studying cease and desist letters concerning online content. We collect and analyze requests to remove material from the web. Our goals are to educate the public, to facilitate research about the different kinds of complaints and requests for removal--both legitimate and questionable--that are being sent to Internet publishers and service providers, and to provide as much transparency as possible about the “ecology” of such notices, in terms of who is sending them and why, and to what effect.Our database contains millions of notices, many of them with a valid legal basis, some of them without, and some on the murky border. The presence of a notice in our database does not indicate a judgment among these possibilities, or that Lumen is authenticating the provenance of that notice or evaluating the validity of the claims it raises.^Further, Lumen is not the sender or original recipient of the requests and notices within its database, and is unable to assist in any way with either removing or restoring on-line content from the web or search engine listings, with "blocking" or restoring access to websites or URLs, or with sending DMCA counter-notices. Lumen documents the notice-and-takedown process and ecology by reporting that a notice or request was sent and received, by and to whom, and regarding what online content. Lumen is unable to provide contact information for notice senders or recipients and does not have any more information about a particular notice than what is present within it. We are unable to provide legal advice.LumenLMN_5df6d506-495c-11ec-89d3-6d15f282ea00Lumen is a project of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University.Wendy SeltzerConceived, developed, and founded in 2002 by then-Berkman Klein Center Fellow Wendy Seltzer, the project, then called "Chilling Effects", was initially focused on requests submitted under the United States' Digital Millennium Copyright Act. As the Internet and its usage has evolved, so has Lumen, and the database now includes complaints of all varieties, including trademark, defamation, and privacy, domestic and international, and court orders.Berkman Klein Center for Internet & SocietyArcadiaLumen is supported by a grant from Arcadia, a charitable fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin.Lumen Past PartnersColorado Samuelson-Glushko Technology Law & Policy Clinic (TLPC)DePaul University College of LawGeorge Washington University Law SchoolSanta Clara University School of Law High Tech Law InstituteStanford Center for Internet & SocietyUniversity of Maine School of LawElectronic Frontier FoundationThe EFF's work on Lumen is supported by the San Francisco Foundation.San Francisco FoundationUSF Law School - IIP Justice ProjectUC Berkeley - Samuelson Law, Technology, & Public Policy ClinicGreater understanding of cease and desist letters concerning online content_5df6d68c-495c-11ec-89d3-6d15f282ea00To study cease and desist letters concerning online content_5df6d79a-495c-11ec-89d3-6d15f282ea00EducationEducate the public_5df6d880-495c-11ec-89d3-6d15f282ea001_5df6d9e8-495c-11ec-89d3-6d15f282ea00ResearchFacilitate research about the different kinds of complaints and requests for removal--both legitimate and questionable--that are being sent to Internet publishers and service providers_5df6dae2-495c-11ec-89d3-6d15f282ea002Internet PublishersInternet Service Providers_5df6dbe6-495c-11ec-89d3-6d15f282ea00TransparencyProvide as much transparency as possible about the “ecology” of such notices, in terms of who is sending them and why, and to what effect._5df6dce0-495c-11ec-89d3-6d15f282ea003DatabaseHost a database of notices_5df6ddda-495c-11ec-89d3-6d15f282ea003.1Lumen Database SourcesThe Lumen database grows by more than 40,000 notices per week, with voluntary submissions provided by companies such as Google, Twitter, YouTube, Wikipedia, Counterfeit Technology, Medium, Stack Exchange, Vimeo, DuckDuckGo, aspects of the University of California system, and Wordpress. As of the summer of 2019, the project hosts approximately twelve million notices, referencing close to four billion URLs. In 2018, the project website was visited over ten million times by users from virtually every country in the world.GoogleTwitterYouTubeWikipediaCounterfeit TechnologyMediumStack ExchangeVimeoDuckDuckGoUniversity of California SystemWordpressOur database contains millions of notices, many of them with a valid legal basis, some of them without, and some on the murky border. The presence of a notice in our database does not indicate a judgment among these possibilities, or that Lumen is authenticating the provenance of that notice or evaluating the validity of the claims it raises.^Further, Lumen is not the sender or original recipient of the requests and notices within its database, and is unable to assist in any way with either removing or restoring on-line content from the web or search engine listings, with "blocking" or restoring access to websites or URLs, or with sending DMCA counter-notices. Lumen documents the notice-and-takedown process and ecology by reporting that a notice or request was sent and received, by and to whom, and regarding what online content. Lumen is unable to provide contact information for notice senders or recipients and does not have any more information about a particular notice than what is present within it. We are unable to provide legal advice.2021-11-19https://www.lumendatabase.org/pages/aboutOwenAmburOwen.Ambur@verizon.net