Is Web Scraping Legal? Let’s Understand Its Legality

Without data, businesses cannot even think of taking any major step in the operation. Data helps businesses engage more with customers and satisfy their demands. At present, businesses can have data from the web, which is readily available there. Businesses use web scrapping processes to gather information from the web. But do you know whether is web scraping legal or not?

The web has become one of the vital sources of gathering data at present. Businesses usually collect relevant data from the web through web scraping and assess it to gain useful insights. We are standing at a crucial point in time where producing an enormous quantity of data is normal. The United States is expected to produce more than 30.6ZB data in 2025.

Therefore, in reality, businesses have more data than ever before, but the issue is how businesses can utilize it. Web scrapping comes into play at this time to help businesses to collect relevant information from the web. However, businesses often face a stigma related to online data scraping whenever they try to do so.

The stigma is whether is web scraping legal or not. To overcome this dilemma, this blog aims to explain the legality of web scraping process in detail. Here, you will also explore standard practices simply followed in web scraping.

The practice of web scraping involves extracting information from the web using a strategic method. Businesses nowadays have two options to scrap data from the web; one is to do it by manual operation. Or, use an automated system for collecting and organizing data from the web. Among both, manual data scraping is the best, which produces fewer errors. Nowadays businesses outsource Web Scraping Services to collect huge chunks of data manually from the web.

On the other hand, many companies invested in sophisticated legal and ethical web scraping tools that make the process smooth and efficient. However, in the case of manual data scraping, the data entry professionals usually pick data from different sources and put them together in the newly created database. They follow the utilize web scraping legal method to compile all the information.

Before we get to know about the legality of web scraping, understanding the purpose of this process is essential. Web scraping solves many purposes and businesses use this process widely for meeting their data needs. Here is the following use of data scraping exclusively highlighted.

Leads in marking term refers to information of potential customers. This information may include phone numbers, names, email addresses, etc. Businesses can directly contact the person and convert them into customers if they have efficient leads. What data scrapers do here is to collect information from the web and prepare leads.

E-commerce websites need periodical updates to stay relevant in the e-commerce industry. This update includes price details and product details. Images, etc. Data scrapers efficiently update the website using all the relevant information collected from the web.

With the help of web scraping legal methods, real estate businesses are competing in the industry. With the integration of the latest data related to properties, these businesses are expanding quickly. Data scrapers not only scrap property details but also scrap agent information and contact details.

A website needs frequent updates to accommodate the latest information in the industry. With the best application of data scrapping, businesses can easily moderate content all over the digital space. It helps businesses to stay relevant in the present market situation.

Businesses can have an efficient database internally with the help of online data scraping. The legal and ethical web scraping process eliminates irrelevant information and makes the raw data into a processed format. Therefore, it can help businesses to have an updated database with all the latest information.

Well, understanding the legality of web scraping becomes relevant at present when businesses handle enormous data regularly, many data regulations question whether is web scraping legal or not. But the answer is yes, data scraping is legal only if the business follows the right method to procure data. Remember that, you can find some grey areas in the data scraping method depending upon your exploration.

As a web scraper, you need to take care of some aspects related to handling sensitive information with web scraping tools. To maintain legality, you need to initiate special measures when quoting personal information or copyrighted information.

Breaching copyrights or taking sensitive personal information may attract complications in the process. Therefore, you need to follow a certain rule while handling these datasets. The rules are very simple but they have many attributes. However, following all of them will save you from the loss of data penalties.

Every country has its set of separate rules for monitoring personal information. Breaching of personal information can cause huge harm to a company's reputation. Therefore, when you initiate utilize web scraping legal process, you need to keep the following things in mind.

Always handle the personal information of the customers with proper measures. Personal information contains the name, address, date of birth, bank account number, etc. In most cases, medical information also counts under the personal information. Whenever you deal with this set of information you must check whether customers have given consent to it or not.

Scraping copyrighted information is not legal as businesses have to get permission from the owner to do that. Sometimes you can find data easily available on the web, which might contain copyrighted elements. Businesses usually copyright their articles, photos, music, etc to secure them over the web. Hence, you need to take special measures while collecting information from the web.

What you can take from the web may not inculcate complication but what you do after taking the information matters here. Thus, if your plan is to replicate the data then you must restrict yourself from doing it. Replicating the copyrighted content might increase the complication of the web scraping legal process.

The LinkedIn vs. hiQ case is about a company called hiQ Labs using information from public LinkedIn profiles. It is just to help employers understand their employees better. LinkedIn didn't like this and said hiQ's actions broke the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. They argued that hiQ wasn't allowed to scrape or collect data from their site.

However, the court (Ninth Circuit) decided that hiQ didn't do anything wrong in web scraping practices because they only used information that was already public on LinkedIn. The court said LinkedIn is like a public bulletin board. The information is there for everyone to see, and it's okay to use it. They said LinkedIn can't stop someone from collecting data that's meant for the public.

This decision is important because it sets a precedent for how companies can use web scraping legal process. It says that if data is public, companies can use it for things like analytics without breaking the law. It's like saying if you put up a flyer with your phone number on a community board, anyone can take a picture of it and use the number. It does not need prior information at all to do so.

Hence, in simpler terms, the court said hiQ didn't do anything illegal by collecting info from public LinkedIn profiles. Because that information was like a flyer on a community board, which is meant for everyone to see and use. This case helps decide how much control social media sites have over information that people share publicly.

Understanding the method of scraping is very important as it determines whether you are following the legal way or not. Remember that, no jurisdiction can penalize you for not following legal methods. But following the legal method is always the best as you are dealing with sensitive information.

Taking the example from LinkedIn vd hiQ, collecting data from the public web is not an illegal practice. But, when your web scraping legal process does not have any protected measure it becomes irrelevant. Therefore, you need to follow a measure where you can easily scrap data using web scraping tools from the public web and make the process legal.

Whenever you enter a web page you must read the terms of service that it laid out first. You must always avoid those web pages that do not allow data scrapping. To make the data scraping easier, you can create an account whenever you scrap data. Creating accounts will always allow you to proceed with online data scraping tasks. But before that, you must always read out everything related to legal and ethical web scraping first.

When it comes to scraping data from the internet you must always prioritize public websites. Public websites are the best source of information when it comes to gathering public information. Many companies use social platforms like LinkedIn to find customers' contact details. These public platforms are best in terms of scraping data and you can find more data on the same platform.

Read our blog: Web Scraping Data Benefits for Real Estates

Avoiding entering into legal trouble must be always your first preference when you choose a web scraping legal process. Avoiding every kind of dilemma in the web scraping process is the best way to maintain legality. Therefore, you need to take some measures from your side to avoid legal complexities.

Here is the list of practices that you can incorporate into your data scraping practices.

Before you initiate the scraping process, you should already review the service term first. Not only reading it can benefit you rather you also need to make yourself familiarize with the practices. Every website has some guidelines that reveal data scraping practices. Thus, you need to give your proper focus on these aspects first. Besides this, some websites might have some terms regarding robots.txt files thus you must check them with great care.

Intellectual property rights provide a safeguard for intangible assets and eliminate their degradation. You need to always prioritize following intellectual property rights whenever you scrap data from any website. The web scraping legal process involves considering IP rights completely. Any kind of infringement activities of IP rights can create legal troubles.

To keep the data scraping process free from legal issues you need to choose always public sources. Choosing the public web is always better than going for the private web. The private web may have some restricted access but they are that much secure as the public web. Hence, choosing the public web over the private web can help you to run data scraping smoothly.

To avoid facing unintended consequences of data scraping, you must always keep the process limited. Limiting the data scraping process will help you avoid data scraping legal claims. Continuous scraping from one source can create legal trouble therefore mixing up different sources will suit here. However, you must follow web scraping practices only when you need them best.

To avoid web scraping legal claims, you must always strictly follow the rules laid out for data scraping. Generally speaking, you won't be able to find these rules as these are not created till now. But you can follow the general rules of data protection whenever you scrape data from any source. This will help you to avoid legal situations in your data scraping process.

Sometimes a lack of awareness can create blunders in the data scraping process, which can cause financial implications also. Therefore, consulting with a legal professional before you initiate the utilize web scraping task always brings out the best results. Many companies also hire legal experts to receive advice for maintaining the data scraping process.

Outsourcing is the best option to avoid any kind of web scraping legal claim smartly. Besides that, businesses can have fresh databases with quality data when they choose to outsource the process. They will use excellent web scraping tools in doing their job. Partnering with a legal web scraping outsourcing company will also bring flow to the operation and bring the best results in the process.

Read Further: Why Outsourcing Web Scraping is Better Than Inhouse?