Content Removal Guidelines

We take the intellectual property rights of others seriously and require that our users do the same. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) established a process for addressing claims of copyright infringement. If you own a copyright or have authority to act on behalf of a copyright owner and want to make a claim that a third party is infringing that copyright on or through GitLab’s services, send a notice that meets the minimum requirements of the DMCA to dmca@gitlab.com, and we will take appropriate action.

DMCA notice requirements

You must include:

  1. Identify the copyrighted work. A description of the copyrighted work that you claim is being infringed;
  2. Identify the allegedly-infringing material. A description of the material you claim is infringing and that you want removed or access to which you want disabled and the URL or other location of that material;
    • Be as specific as possible. If you believe less than the whole project infringes, identify the specific project, file, or line numbers within a file a user would need to delete in order to remedy the infringement.
    • GitLab will not automatically disable forks of a project unless they are explicitly identified within the notice you send. It is your responsibility to determine that the material identified, including any fork(s) included in a notice, independently meet the notice requirements.
  3. Provide contact information. Your name, title (if acting as an agent), address, telephone number, and email address;
  4. Include the following statement: “I have a good faith belief that the use of the copyrighted material I am complaining of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law (for example, as a fair use)”;
  5. Include the following statement: “The information in this notice is accurate and, under penalty of perjury, I am the owner, or authorized to act on behalf of the owner, of the copyright or of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed”; and
  6. Signature. An electronic or physical signature of the owner of the copyright or a person authorized to act on the owner’s behalf.

Submissions under this DMCA Policy should be sent to dmca@gitlab.com.

We will review your submission and take whatever action we deem appropriate under the DMCA, including the removal of the challenged content from the website. Furthermore, we may, in appropriate circumstances, disable access or terminate the account(s) of the reported user(s).

DMCA counter-notice requirements

The owner of the allegedly-infringing content may submit a DMCA counter-notice to dmca@gitlab.com. The counter-notice must comply with the requirements of the DMCA, and must include the following:

  1. Contact Information. Your name, title (if acting as an agent), physical address, email address, and phone number;
  2. Content Identification. A reasonable identification of the material that has been removed or to which access has been blocked;
  3. Statement under Perjury. Include the following statement: “I swear, under penalty of perjury, that I have a good faith belief that the material was removed or disabled as a result of mistake or misidentification of the material to be removed or disabled”;
  4. Consent to Jurisdiction. Include one of following statements (as appropriate):
    • If based in the United States: “I consent to the jurisdiction of the Federal District Court for the judicial district in which my provided address is located”
    • If based outside of the United States: “I consent to the jurisdiction of any United States Federal District Court in which GitLab may be found”
  5. Consent to service of process. Include the following statement: “I will accept service of process from the person who provided the original notification or an agent of such person”; and
  6. Signature. An electronic or physical signature of the owner of the copyright or the person authorized to act on the owner’s behalf.

We will review the counter-notice, and:

  • if the counter-notice doesn’t satisfy the DMCA requirements, we’ll request a revised submission; or
  • if the counter-notice is complete and valid, we’ll forward the counter-notice to the person who filed the original takedown notice, advising that the challenged content will be reinstated within 10-14 business days, unless we receive a notification that the copyright owner is seeking a court order regarding this matter.

Anti-Circumvention Technology

The DMCA prohibits the circumvention of technical protection measures that prevent access to copyrighted works. If you believe that content hosted on GitLab violates this prohibition, send a complaint to dmca@gitlab.com. The complaint should include the following:

  1. Identify the copyrighted work. A description of the copyrighted work that is being protected by the technical measure;
  2. Identify the alleged circumventing content. Be sure to include detailed statements that describe:
    • What the technical protection measures are;
    • How the technical protection measures effectively control access to the copyrighted work; and
    • How the content hosted on GitLab is designed to circumvent those technical protection measures.
  3. Provide contact information. Your name, title (if acting as an agent), address, telephone number, and email address;
  4. Include the following statement: “I have a good faith belief that the use of the copyrighted material I am complaining of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law (for example, as a fair use)”;
  5. Include the following statement: “The information in this notice is accurate and, under penalty of perjury, I am the owner, or authorized to act on behalf of the owner, of the copyright or of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed”; and
  6. Signature. An electronic or physical signature of the owner of the copyright or a person authorized to act on the owner’s behalf.

We will review your complaint and take whatever action we deem appropriate under the DMCA, including the removal of the challenged content. Furthermore, we may, in appropriate circumstances, disable access or terminate the account(s) of the reported user(s).

Trademark takedown request requirements

If you want to report content on GitLab that you believe infringes your trademark, provide the following information:

  1. Details of the original trademark (and a description if it’s a logo).
  2. A list of the countries in which the trademark is registered.
  3. The registration number(s) of the trademark.
  4. A scanned copy of the trademark registration certificate(s) or screenshot of the registration on the website or database of the applicable national intellectual property office(s).
  5. A declaration of the following statement: “By submitting this notice, I state that I have a good-faith belief that the reported use, in the manner that I have complained of, is not authorized by the intellectual property rights owner, its agent or the law; that the information contained in this notice is accurate; and, under penalty of perjury, that I am authorized to act on behalf of the owner of the intellectual property rights at issue”.

You can send this information to dmca@gitlab.com, you should receive an automated confirmation of receipt.

Namespaces and other disputes

Disputes regarding namespaces, ownership and trademarks are not governed by DMCA. These disputes must be resolved by the parties involved. GitLab will never act as arbitrators or intermediaries in these disputes and will not take any action without the appropriate legal orders.

For more information, see our Namespace and Trademark Policy and Ownership Dispute Policy

EU Illegal Content Reporting

The DSA requires hosting services to provide a method for people to report content that is potentially illegal in the EU.

Please use the DSA form to report content that you believe is illegal in the European Union. This form should be used by individuals claiming legal rights in the EU, as well as individuals or entities designated as trusted flaggers pursuant to the DSA. Trusted flagger reports will be prioritized for review, in accordance with the DSA. We also ask individuals who report potentially illegal content in the EU to provide clear and concise information in English, or provide an English translation, wherever possible.

GitLab may restrict access to content determined to violate the law(s) of the EU country specified in your report. If you want to report a potential violation of GitLab’s Acceptable Use Policy or Community Code of Conduct policies rather than an EU legal violation, please refer to this guide on how to report abuse. Note that if you don’t have a GitLab account, you can report potential violations by contacting the GitLab Trust and Safety team at abuse@gitlab.com.

Last modified January 30, 2025: Replace ref links with regular links (c4c9b3d1)