In most countries, intellectual property rights around data prevent third-parties from using, reusing and redistributing data without explicit permission. Where the existence of rights is uncertain, applying a license can provide much-needed clarity.

With the increasing move towards research data sharing, anyone wanting to share data needs to understand licensing. The Australian National Data Service (ANDS) provides prospective data re-users with information on the terms and conditions that apply to sharing research data.

AusGOAL, the Australian Open Access and Licensing framework, guides you through a set of simple questions (the Licensing Review). Answer these to determine the most appropriate license to attach to your data or information. The AusGOAL suite of licenses includes:

• Creative commons (CC) licenses there are six to choose from)
• AusGOAL' Restrictive License template (RL)

The Creative Commons licenses included in AusGOAL are listed in order of least restrictive to most restrictive:

• Attribution (BY)
• Attribution non-commercial (BY-NC)
• Attribution share alike (BY-SA)
• Attribution no Derivatives (BY-ND)
• Attribution non-commercial share alike (BY-NC-SA)
• Attribution non-commercial no Derivatives (BY-NC-ND)
• Restrictive License template (RL)

AusGOAL's Licensing Review involves the following steps:

1. The identification of the material to be licensed.
2. The identification and review of any restrictions applicable to the original content. (Original content is that which is unique and original to the material. It does not contain information from another source or sources.)
3. The identification of other input sources used in the creation of the material.
4. The identification and review of publishing restrictions relating to the additional inputs.
5. The selection of an appropriate License based on the outcome of the Review.