Data Records Policy

This Data Records Policy explains how a Keelhelm data-records product — a public site that publishes facts drawn from an official government or municipal record — sources that data, keeps it accurate, and handles correction requests. It applies on top of that product's own Terms of Service and Privacy Policy wherever they say it does; where those pages differ, this policy fills in the shared ground so we don't repeat it in every product's own terms.

What this policy covers

A Keelhelm data-records product republishes facts from a specific official source — for example, a federal agency's public census of regulated businesses, or a city's own open-data publication of permits it issued. The records describe registered businesses (such as a motor carrier or a licensed contractor) or properties (such as a building's permit history) — never a private individual's personal or financial life. This policy covers the sourcing, accuracy, correction, and permitted-use rules common to every such product; each product's own pages tell you which official source or sources it draws from.

Public-record basis

We publish only facts that are already public records, obtained through an official, ordinary channel — a government agency's own bulk-data or API program, or a municipality's own open-data portal — never a scrape of a paywalled, login-gated, or access-controlled system. Two source types back the products this policy applies to:

• Federal regulatory data (for example, the U.S. Department of Transportation's motor-carrier census and safety data) is a work of the United States Government. Under 17 U.S.C. § 105, U.S. Government works carry no copyright, and the underlying facts — registration status, authority, safety ratings — are not copyrightable in any case. The agency's dissemination program explicitly makes this data available for public reuse.
• Municipal permit data is published by the city itself through its official open-data program, under that city's published reuse terms. We rely on the city's own bulk export or API, not on any third party's copy, and we honor that portal's rate limits and terms.

Where a source publishes an official suppression or redaction list for particular records, we honor it in our own copies within one collection cycle.

Accuracy and data-as-of stamps

Every record page shows a "data as of <date>" stamp reflecting when we last successfully refreshed that record from the official source, and a link back to that source's own record. The official source is always authoritative — our copy is a convenience, refreshed on a regular schedule, and can lag or occasionally miss a change between refreshes. If something here doesn't match the source, the source controls; please use the correction procedure below and tell us.

Correction and opt-out

If a record about you or your business is wrong, out of date, or you believe it should be suppressed, contact us using the correction link on the record page in question, or email legal (at) keelhelm (dot) com, or use the Keelhelm privacy request form. A granted request is suppressed from everything we publish or serve — the site, our API, our sitemaps and search listings — within 72 hours. Suppression happens at the point we serve the data, not by altering our copy of the source record: we never edit or delete the underlying record we received from the official source, because that copy exists to keep our data faithful and auditable against it. If the source itself later corrects or removes the record, our next refresh picks that up automatically.

Not a consumer reporting agency

A Keelhelm data-records product is not a consumer reporting agency, and nothing it publishes is a "consumer report." The records describe a business or a property, not a consumer's personal creditworthiness, character, or standing. Nothing here is provided or maintained for the purpose of, and it must not be used for, determining any individual's eligibility for credit, employment, tenancy, insurance, or any other purpose regulated by the U.S. Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA).

This is a commitment about how we operate, not only a disclaimer on the page. In 2023 the U.S. Federal Trade Commission took action against two background-check sites for operating as unregistered consumer reporting agencies — not because of what data they held, but because of how they marketed it: advertising and site copy aimed at screening decisions about a person made them a CRA in the FTC's eyes, and a disclaimer on the page did not change that. So we hold ourselves to a conduct rule, not just a label: we do not market, advertise, or write site copy aimed at using our data to screen, vet, or evaluate a person for a job, a lease, credit, or insurance, and we do not accept that kind of use case. If you notice copy that reads otherwise, please tell us — see Contact below.

What we do not publish

We do not publish the home street address or personal phone number of an individual named on a record (for example, the owner of a one-truck carrier or the applicant on a permit) — only the business or property information the official source designates as the public record. We do not carry, and will not add, any driver-level or state motor-vehicle/DMV record of any kind.

Keelhelm company policies

General data-subject rights (access, correction, deletion, and the rest) are described in the company-wide Keelhelm Privacy Policy (Your rights), and general reporting of a concern is handled under the Reporting & Notice-and-Action Policy; both apply here too.

Contact

Questions about a specific record, a correction request, or this policy: legal (at) keelhelm (dot) com.