On 06/08/2025 08:00, John Rowbotham via Talk-GB wrote:
Each entry includes the full address and billing area but that bit is indeed subject to OS rules. I've never been clear though how the OS might 'own' a town name or indeed the housename someone has given to their own property and which finds itself used by others. A house number yes, but the name?
It's complicated. There's a lot more to postal addresses than the way it's typically written on an envelope. Royal Mail's Postcode Address File (PAF) contains not just addresses as would normally be used by humans, but also postal metadata used to help route and manage postal mail. And OS's AddressBase product adds UPRNs, geographic coordinates and cross-references with other OS products to data licensed from PAF.
Both PAF and AddressBase are very strongly protected by their owners, mainly because there's a lot of data in them that is commercially valuable and can't easily be found or derived without them. Courier firms, for example (at least, reputable courier firms) rely on this data because AddressBase will not only tell them precisely where the property is but also where your front door is, how accessible it is from the street and also how accessible the street itself is to different vehicles.
However, the address presented as part of the published council tax band information doesn't include any of this metadata. All you've got is a simple, human-useable postal address, without any of the PAF's routing data or AddressBase's geographic data.
This is where it gets complicated. Because the published address only contains information that is public, without any proprietary metadata, there's no infringeable copyright in the individual entry. Things like the name and number of your house, and the name of the street and town it's in, are simple facts, which aren't subject to copyright. The postcode is proprietary to Royal Mail, but that's published under OGL anyway. So a single, human readable postal address can be used and republished by anyone for any purpose without infringing any rights.
OS does, though, have database right in the compilation of addresses derived from AddressBase, even where those addresses are, individually, public or open data. So does Royal Mail with compilations of addresses derived from PAF. So you can look up a postal address on Royal Mail's website, and then use it to send a letter or parcel. But you can't take a full copy (or even a significant subset) of the entire list of addresses without infringing database right in the compilation.
Then again, what makes it even more complicated is that database right is still not fully defined in law. The various Football Dataco court cases are possibly relevant here; it's arguable that a simple list of postal addresses comprising only public and open source data (eg, the type of address you'd write on an envelope, or use to look up your council tax band) doesn't qualify for database right protection.
And, in practice, neither Royal Mail nor OS seem interested in pursuing potential infringement where the only data used is the public, open postal address. A quick DuckDuckGo reveals several websites that allow you to look up your council tax band, these all appear to be simply bulk copying (presumably screen-scraping) the official VOA site. All of them seem to have been around for a while, and they're easy enough to find, which suggests that neither OS nor RM are bothered too much about them.
My gut feeling is that both RM and OS are more interested in protecting and monetising their metadata that isn't part of a simple, human-usable postal address. Given that OGL postcodes and UPRNs can relatively easily be matched up with independently derived address databases (eg, OSM's database), any attempt to crack down on unauthorised use of simple addresses derived from AddressBase or PAF might serve only to encourage users to migrate to different suppliers. And the worst case scenario for OS and RM is that they take a potential infringer to court and lose a Dataco-like case. While a full OGL release of simple addresses isn't on the cards in the foreseeable future, it's in both OS and RM's interests to encourage potential customers to see their detailed, proprietary data as the gold standard for property addressing and worth the cost. At the moment, those goals are best served by not rocking the boat.
None of that is really relevant to OSM, though. Other users of address data may well be willing to sail close to the wind, and they may well get away with it. But OSM can only use data that is public (eg, obtained by observation, such as a house number on a door) or is acquired under a compatible licence (eg, postcodes under OGL). So importing bulk data from council tax banding is, at the moment, off limits.
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