This helps protect intellectual property right owners, and prevents the illegal sale of unauthorized copies.
Policy overview
Only copyright owners or persons authorised to sell the product by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law are permitted to list their products copied onto recordable media (includes items such as VHS tapes, audio tapes, CD-Rs, DVD-Rs, flash drives, and any other recordable media type) on eBay. When you list any type of recordable media, you must state your copyright ownership or licence to resell these items in your listings.
Activity on eBay is required to follow this policy, the eBay User Agreement and all applicable laws, as well as respect the rights of third parties. If it doesn’t, eBay may take action consistent with applicable laws and the eBay User Agreement, and may even be legally required to do so. Such actions may include, as an example only: Removing the listing or other content, issuing a warning, restricting activity or account suspension.
What are the guidelines?
Allowed
- Media where the seller is the copyright owner or authorised to sell the item by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law. The listing and product must clearly state that the seller is authorised to sell the item. For example, a band releasing its latest album on CD-R can list the album on eBay as long as they follow our guidelines
Not allowed
The following are examples of items that aren't allowed on eBay:
- Compilations of multiple e-books or audio books on one DVD-R or other recordable media
- Music compilations on CD-R
- The entire first season of a television series copied on one DVD-R
- Compilation of multiple "freeware" and "shareware" programs on one CD-R
- A VHS copy of a movie taped off of television
- CD-Rs containing scanned pages from a book, magazine, manual, or other copyrighted written materials that weren't written by the seller
- Bootleg recordings (unauthorised recording of concerts or live performances) See our bootleg recordings policy
- If you buy an album or recording on eBay that was released by a local band on CD-R, you're not allowed to list the album on eBay even though the band released the album on CD-R, because you're not the copyright owner
Why does eBay have this policy?
Since the sale of unauthorised copyright items is illegal, we don't allow those items on eBay. This policy helps protect buyers from purchasing illegal merchandise and helps intellectual property rights owners protect their rights.