Policies and guidelines

The University of Queensland (UQ) Library is open to staff and students of UQ and we welcome students and researchers from other universities and the broader community. We ask that you observe our policies and terms of use while using our spaces and resources. 

Terms of use for Library resources

Library resources are protected by copyright and licences.

The resources provided by the University of Queensland Library – including books, journal articles, audio-visual works, artworks, musical works, and databases and their contents – are in most cases protected by copyright and are often subject to licence agreements between the University and our content providers (“Publishers”) that may place further restrictions on your use.

You must use our online collections in compliance with all UQ policies, copyright laws and UQ’s commercial licences with resource providers.

You may not share, re-publish, copy or enter into AI technologies any part of a resource accessed from our online collections unless expressly permitted in the licence terms for that resource.

Where available, click the Show Licence button in Library Search results for further details about use of a particular resource, including information about other restrictions including data/text mining, distribution, systematic copying and downloading.

Permitted uses

The University of Queensland Library makes resources available for your personal research or study. You may only use these resources in accordance with the policies and procedures listed above, each Publisher’s terms and conditions of use, and (unless contrary to those terms and conditions) the Copyright Act 1968 (Cth.).

Prohibited uses

Except as permitted under each Publisher's terms and conditions of use, you must not:

• Use UQ Library resource content as an input to generative AI products or services
• Copy, share, download or post Library resources to mailing lists, bulletin boards, websites or social media
• Sell, rent, licence, supply, assign or otherwise authorise the use of any UQ Library resources by any other person or organisation
• Use, or authorise the use of, UQ Library resources for any commercial purpose
• Record, publicly perform, adapt, translate or broadcast resources without express permission from the copyright owner.
• Use spiders, robots or crawlers, or any other automated process (or any equivalent manual process) to download or extract UQ Library resources without express permission from the Publisher or copyright owner.

Accessing and using University of Queensland Library resources

By accessing or using resources provided by the University of Queensland, you agree to use them in an ethical, legal, and responsible manner and in compliance with:

• The University of Queensland Information and Communication Technology Policy and the Acceptable Use of ICT Resources Guidelines
• The UQ Library Code of Practice Policy
• The relevant Student or Staff Code of Conduct
• The Student Integrity and Misconduct Policy
• The Teaching and Learning Roles and Responsibilities Policy and Procedure
• The Course Design Policy
• The Communication of Copyright Works Procedure (to be confirmed)  
• The Copyright Act 1968 (Cth.), in particular the provisions regarding fair dealing, and copying and communicating works for personal research or study
• The relevant terms of use provided by the publishers that govern access to their resources.

Failure to comply with one or more of these could result in suspension or revocation of your access to the University of Queensland Library, as well as other disciplinary steps. In addition, you may be subject to direct action by the Publisher or copyright owner.

Using Library spaces

Visit our guidelines for using Library spaces