Copyright & DMCA Policy

Effective: 2026-05-02 · Last updated: 2026-05-02

OffCoder respects intellectual property rights. If you believe content stored or made available through OffCoder infringes your copyright, you may submit a takedown notice using the procedure below. We respond to compliant notices, and we operate a counter-notice procedure for users whose content has been removed in error. Repeat infringers are terminated.

1. Scope

This Copyright & DMCA Policy describes how OffCoder ("OffCoder", "we", "us", "our") handles claims of copyright infringement relating to content stored on or transmitted through the OffCoder Service (the "Service"). It covers both notices submitted under the United States Digital Millennium Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. §512 ("DMCA"), and equivalent infringement notices under the Indian Copyright Act, 1957, the Information Technology Act, 2000 (and Rules thereunder), and other applicable copyright regimes.

2. What we host

OffCoder is principally a private workspace: most user content is private to the account holder and not accessible to others. Some users may publish content using our hosted-service feature at <handle>-<project>.offcoder.dev. Public publication of infringing content via that feature is the most common ground for a DMCA notice; private project content can also be the subject of an infringement claim where the rights-holder identifies the user and demonstrates standing.

3. Notice of alleged infringement (takedown notice)

To submit a notice under §512(c)(3) of the DMCA (or equivalent notice under Indian copyright law), email dmca@offcoder.com with the subject line DMCA Notice — <rights-holder or agency name> (use the rights-holder's name if you are the owner; the agency or law-firm name if you are submitting on the owner's behalf) and include all of the following:

  1. Identification of the copyrighted work claimed to have been infringed. If you are claiming infringement of multiple works on a single page, a representative list will suffice.
  2. Identification of the allegedly infringing material with sufficient detail for us to locate it: the full URL on offcoder.com or the hosted-service domain, OR — for content not publicly accessible — enough information about the user, the project, and the artefact for us to investigate.
  3. Your contact information: full legal name, telephone number, and email address. (We will use these only for the purpose of processing your notice.)
  4. A statement that you have a good-faith belief that the use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law.
  5. A statement made under penalty of perjury, that the information in the notice is accurate and that you are the copyright owner or are authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.
  6. Your physical or electronic signature.

Incomplete notices may be rejected. Misleading or fraudulent notices may give rise to liability under §512(f) of the DMCA and equivalent doctrines under Indian and other applicable law; we reserve the right to recover our costs from any party who knowingly misrepresents.

4. Counter-notice

If your content was removed because of a DMCA notice you believe is mistaken or wrongful, you may submit a counter-notice. Email dmca@offcoder.com with subject DMCA Counter-Notice — <your name> and include:

  1. Identification of the material that has been removed and the location at which it appeared before removal.
  2. Your full legal name, address, telephone, and email.
  3. A statement under penalty of perjury that you have a good-faith belief that the material was removed as a result of mistake or misidentification.
  4. A statement that you consent to the jurisdiction of the courts in the judicial district in which your address is located, or — if your address is outside the United States — that you consent to the jurisdiction of any judicial district in which OffCoder may be found, and that you will accept service of process from the person who submitted the original notice.
  5. Your physical or electronic signature.

If you submit a valid counter-notice, we will forward a copy to the original complainant. Unless the complainant files an action seeking a court order against you within the statutory window — not less than ten (10) and not more than fourteen (14) business days following our receipt of your counter-notice, per §512(g)(2)(C) of the DMCA — we will restore the removed material at the end of that window. We make no representations about the legal merits of any notice or counter-notice; we follow the statutory procedure.

5. Repeat infringers

OffCoder maintains a policy, in compliance with §512(i) of the DMCA, of terminating in appropriate circumstances the accounts of users determined, in our reasonable discretion, to be repeat infringers. The threshold takes into account the number of valid notices received against the account (as a working baseline, three substantiated notices in any rolling twelve-month period will trigger account termination, although a smaller number may suffice for serious infringement and a larger number may be tolerated for clearly disputed claims), the seriousness of the infringement, the user's response to the notices, and the disposition of any counter-notices.

6. Action we may take on receipt of a notice

On receipt of a compliant notice, we may, at our reasonable discretion: (a) notify the user whose content is the subject of the notice; (b) remove or disable access to the allegedly infringing content; (c) preserve a copy of the content and associated metadata for the purpose of forwarding to the complainant or for evidentiary purposes; (d) suspend or terminate the account if circumstances warrant; and (e) where required, report to law-enforcement.

Where the content is private (not publicly hosted) and the rights-holder has not provided sufficient standing, we may decline to act on the notice and ask for further information; we will not, in such cases, disclose the user's identity or content without proper legal process.

7. AI-generated content note

OffCoder is an AI coding tool. AI-generated output may, in rare cases, reproduce or closely paraphrase content from the corpus on which the upstream model was trained. OffCoder does not warrant that any AI output is original or non-infringing — see Terms §5. If you believe an AI output you encountered through the Service infringes your copyright, the in-app flag/report mechanism is a useful supplementary signal that helps us improve our content filters; however, an in-app flag is not a DMCA notice and does not by itself preserve any rights you have under §512 or trigger our statutory takedown obligations. To invoke the §512 procedure (or its Indian-law equivalent) and obtain the corresponding remedies, you must submit a formal notice that meets the requirements in §3 of this Policy. We will use AI-output flags to inform our content-filter improvements, but model behaviour is ultimately governed by the upstream provider; redress for the underlying training data may need to be sought from the provider directly.

8. Indian-law specifics

Where the rights asserted are under the Indian Copyright Act 1957 or related rules, the same procedure applies, with the additional note that under Section 79 of the Information Technology Act 2000 and the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules 2021, OffCoder is an "intermediary" and is entitled to the safe-harbour conditional on observing due diligence — including acting expeditiously on a court order or notice from an appropriate government authority. We will act expeditiously on properly framed notices issued by Indian courts or authorities, and within the specific 36-hour window prescribed by Rule 3(2)(b) of the IT Rules 2021 for those categories of content (CSAM, content that exposes the private area of an individual, content that depicts a person in a sexual act, impersonation, and similar categories) for which that Rule applies. Other categories — including general copyright takedowns — are actioned expeditiously without a fixed 36-hour clock unless a court order or competent authority specifies a shorter timeline.

9. Designated agent / contact

Email is the canonical channel: dmca@offcoder.com. We operate a DMCA-style takedown procedure substantially as described above and aim to comply with §512(c) on its own terms. Status of US Copyright Office designation: registration of a designated agent with the U.S. Copyright Office under §512(c)(2) requires a registered legal entity. Because OffCoder is presently operated as a sole proprietorship pending incorporation, we have not yet completed the Copyright Office's online directory registration; we will register the designated agent and publish the registration URL here within 60 days of incorporation. Until then, this Policy operates as a voluntary contractual takedown mechanism, and rights-holders who require a registered §512 safe-harbour intermediary should be aware that the statutory designation is not yet complete. We will publish a postal address for service of legal process at the same time. Electronic notice in compliance with §512(c) and the IT Rules is accepted at the email address above.

10. False notices and counter-notices

Submitting a notice or counter-notice you know to be materially false subjects you to liability for damages under §512(f) of the DMCA and equivalent provisions of applicable law. Do not submit a notice if you are not the copyright owner (or its authorized agent), and do not submit a counter-notice if you do not have a good-faith belief that the original notice was wrongful.

11. Trademark complaints

This Policy governs copyright takedowns. Trademark infringement is governed by separate law and is not addressed by §512 of the DMCA. If you believe your trademark is being infringed by content stored or made available through the Service — including, for example, a phishing or impersonation page hosted at <handle>-<project>.offcoder.dev that uses your mark to mislead users — email dmca@offcoder.com with the subject line Trademark Complaint — <rights-holder name>. Include: (a) identification of the registered or unregistered mark and the jurisdiction of registration; (b) the URL or location of the allegedly infringing content; (c) a description of how the use is likely to confuse consumers or otherwise infringes; (d) your contact information; and (e) a statement of good-faith belief and signature equivalent to those in §3. We respond to trademark complaints on a case-by-case basis, balancing the rights asserted against any defences (nominative fair use, descriptive use, etc.) and may require evidence of registration where the asserted right is registered.

Where your complaint involves the domain name itself rather than (or in addition to) the content hosted at it — for example, an alleged abusive registration of <your-mark>.offcoder.dev — the appropriate forum may be a domain-name dispute-resolution proceeding rather than (or alongside) this trademark process: ICANN's Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy (UDRP) applies to most generic top-level domains (gTLDs), and the .IN Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (INDRP) applies to .in ccTLD registrations. offcoder.dev sub-domains are issued under our control and are not standalone domain registrations, so a UDRP/INDRP claim against the sub-domain itself is not the right vehicle — the trademark-complaint procedure above is. We mention the policies for completeness.

12. Modifications

We may revise this Policy. Material changes will be notified by an updated effective date and, where appropriate, by email.