Legal Basis & Data Sources

Last Updated: April 18, 2026

1. What we publish

Zabalist aggregates, normalizes, classifies, and republishes information drawn from government public records and other publicly accessible sources, including:

• Construction project registrations from the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation (TDLR)
• Building permits from City of Austin, Travis County, Williamson County, Hays County, and other Texas municipal and county permit systems
• Property and appraisal records from Travis CAD, Williamson CAD, Hays CAD, and similar appraisal districts
• Site plan and development case data from municipal planning departments
• Procurement bids from the Texas Electronic State Business Daily (ESBD), federal SAM.gov, and other publicly posted procurement notices
• Federal databases including SBA certifications and IRS public information
• Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED) regional and macroeconomic series
• Business listings from publicly accessible directories (HBA, TAB, ABC, and similar trade associations) and from the Google Places API
• User-submitted business profile information from owners who claim their listings

For a complete inventory, see Section 2.1 of our Terms of Service and Section 2.4 of our Privacy Policy.

2. Federal law

2.1 First Amendment — protected speech

The collection and publication of information drawn from government public records is core protected speech under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Supreme Court held in Cox Broadcasting Corp. v. Cohn, 420 U.S. 469 (1975), that a state may not impose civil liability on the truthful publication of information obtained from public government records. The Court reaffirmed and extended this in Smith v. Daily Mail Publishing Co., 443 U.S. 97 (1979), and Florida Star v. B.J.F., 491 U.S. 524 (1989), holding that punishment for the truthful publication of lawfully obtained information requires a state interest of the highest order.

More recently, in Sorrell v. IMS Health Inc., 564 U.S. 552 (2011), the Court extended First Amendment protection specifically to the commercial aggregation and sale of factual data, treating data as speech for constitutional purposes.

2.2 Copyright — facts are not copyrightable

Facts contained in government public records are not protected by copyright. In Feist Publications, Inc. v. Rural Telephone Service Co., 499 U.S. 340 (1991), the Supreme Court held that facts are uncopyrightable, and that mere alphabetical compilations of facts likewise lack the originality required for copyright protection.

Government-authored works at the federal level are not subject to copyright at all (17 U.S.C. § 105), and most state-produced regulatory data — including TDLR permit data — is treated as factual public-record information that any party may republish. Our compilation, including selection, coordination, arrangement, normalization, classification, and AI-derived enrichment, is a separately copyrightable work product under 17 U.S.C. §§ 101 and 103, but the underlying public facts are free for any party to gather and republish.

2.3 Federal records transparency

The federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. § 552, and parallel state public-records laws reflect a strong public-policy presumption in favor of access to government information. There is no federal statute that prohibits private aggregation, normalization, or republication of state public records by third parties.

3. Texas state law

3.1 Texas Public Information Act (TPIA)

Under the Texas Public Information Act, Tex. Gov’t Code Ch. 552, all information collected, assembled, or maintained by or for a Texas governmental body is presumed public and must be disclosed unless a specific statutory exception applies. TDLR construction project data, municipal building permit records, and appraisal district records are public records under the TPIA.

The TPIA’s targeted confidentiality exceptions cover narrowly defined categories — for example, Social Security numbers (Tex. Gov’t Code § 552.147), driver’s license numbers (§ 552.130), home addresses and personal phone numbers of public employees and certain protected persons (§ 552.117, § 552.1175), and financial-account information (§ 552.136). Business contact information voluntarily submitted on a public permit, license, or registration application is not within those protected categories and is therefore subject to public disclosure under the TPIA.

3.2 Texas Data Privacy and Security Act (TDPSA)

The Texas Data Privacy and Security Act, Tex. Bus. & Com. Code Ch. 541 (effective July 1, 2024), governs the processing of consumer personal data by certain businesses. Critically for aggregators of public records, the TDPSA expressly excludes “publicly available information” from the definition of “personal data”:

• Tex. Bus. & Com. Code § 541.001(19) defines “personal data” and provides that the term “does not include deidentified data or publicly available information.”
• Tex. Bus. & Com. Code § 541.001(27) defines “publicly available information” as information that is “lawfully made available through government records” or information a business has a reasonable basis to believe is lawfully made available to the general public.

Because TDLR permit data, municipal building permit data, ESBD bid notices, SAM.gov data, appraisal district records, and similar government-record information fall squarely within § 541.001(27), they are not “personal data” under the TDPSA. Consumer rights granted by the TDPSA — including the right to access, correct, or delete personal data — therefore do not attach to records sourced from these public sources.

Texas residents retain TDPSA rights with respect to information we collect directly from them through their own use of our Services (such as account information, Property Tax Tool inputs, or claimed-profile submissions). See Section 11.3 of our Privacy Policy for how to exercise those rights.

3.3 Other state privacy laws

Comprehensive state privacy statutes generally include parallel “publicly available information” or “government records” carve-outs. For example, the California Consumer Privacy Act (Cal. Civ. Code § 1798.140(v)(2)) excludes from “personal information” data that is lawfully made available from federal, state, or local government records. The result is consistent: information drawn from government public records is generally outside the reach of consumer-privacy deletion rights.

4. Removal and correction requests — how we evaluate them

We take data-quality and removal requests seriously and review every one we receive. The legal framework above shapes how we respond:

• Government public records (TDLR, municipal permits, appraisal districts, ESBD, SAM.gov, etc.): generally cannot be removed, because (a) the underlying records are required by Texas and federal law to be public, (b) they fall within the TDPSA “publicly available information” exception (§ 541.001(27)), and (c) republication is protected speech under Cox Broadcasting and its progeny. If a record contains an error, the correction must be made at the originating government agency; once the upstream record is updated, our next refresh will reflect the change.
• Information from non-governmental publicly accessible sources (for example, third-party trade-association directories or business-listing APIs): we will consider good-faith removal requests case-by-case and will, where reasonable and consistent with our agreements with upstream providers, suppress or modify a listing.
• Claimed business profile content: the verified business owner controls the editable portion of their profile. To take control of a profile, claim it here.
• Statutorily protected information accidentally exposed (for example, an SSN or a § 552.117 protected home address that should have been redacted by the source agency): contact us immediately at privacy@zabalist.com and we will suppress pending review.
• Inaccurate, defamatory, or AI-misclassified content we authored ourselves (as opposed to facts drawn from a source agency): we will correct or remove on request.

To submit a request, use our contact removal page or email privacy@zabalist.com. Please identify the specific page or record, the source you believe it was drawn from, and the basis for your request. We respond to verified requests within a reasonable time.

5. Bottom line

Zabalist aggregates information that government agencies are required by law to make public, that the U.S. Supreme Court has held is protected from suppression under the First Amendment, that is not subject to copyright as factual content, and that is expressly excluded from Texas’s consumer-privacy statute. We aggregate it, normalize it, and present it because doing so makes Texas’s construction marketplace more transparent and efficient for everyone who participates in it.

6. Citations index

• U.S. Const. amend. I
• Cox Broadcasting Corp. v. Cohn, 420 U.S. 469 (1975)
• Smith v. Daily Mail Publishing Co., 443 U.S. 97 (1979)
• Florida Star v. B.J.F., 491 U.S. 524 (1989)
• Feist Publications, Inc. v. Rural Telephone Service Co., 499 U.S. 340 (1991)
• Sorrell v. IMS Health Inc., 564 U.S. 552 (2011)
• 17 U.S.C. §§ 101, 103, 105 (U.S. Copyright Act)
• 5 U.S.C. § 552 (Federal Freedom of Information Act)
• Tex. Gov’t Code Ch. 552 (Texas Public Information Act)
• Tex. Gov’t Code §§ 552.117, 552.1175, 552.130, 552.136, 552.147 (TPIA confidentiality exceptions)
• Tex. Bus. & Com. Code Ch. 541 (Texas Data Privacy and Security Act)
• Tex. Bus. & Com. Code § 541.001(19) (definition of “personal data” — excludes publicly available information)
• Tex. Bus. & Com. Code § 541.001(27) (definition of “publicly available information”)
• Cal. Civ. Code § 1798.140(v)(2) (CCPA “publicly available information” exclusion)