ARCS is stewarded by Vega Commons Project, Inc., a New York not-for-profit corporation. The ARCS text may be read, shared, cited, and implemented. The ARCS name and any formal conformance or certification designations remain governed so that the public is not misled about authorship, endorsement, or official status.

Trademarks. ARCS and Automated Record Custody Standard are trademarks of Vega Commons Project, Inc.

Use of ARCS materials is governed by two policies:

ARCS Trademark Policy
ARCS Document Use Policy

ARCS Trademark Policy

Version 1.0 · Effective 2026 · Vega Commons Project, Inc.

1. Purpose

This policy governs use of the ARCS name, the ARCS logo, and related source and status designations used in connection with the Automated Record Custody Standard. Its purpose is to permit accurate reference to ARCS while preventing confusion about authorship, publication status, conformance, certification, endorsement, or affiliation.

2. Covered Marks

This policy applies to: (a) ARCS; (b) Automated Record Custody Standard; (c) any ARCS logo or stylized wordmark; (d) any badge, seal, or graphic issued by Vega Commons Project, Inc. in connection with ARCS; (e) any designation used by Vega Commons Project, Inc. to indicate official publication, conformance, certification, or endorsement status.

3. Ownership

ARCS and related marks are owned by Vega Commons Project, Inc. No use of the ARCS marks creates any right, title, or interest in them.

4. Permitted Referential Use

No prior written permission is required for truthful referential use of the ARCS name where the use is reasonably necessary to identify the standard and does not imply sponsorship, endorsement, certification, or affiliation.

Examples include: (a) “This policy was developed with reference to ARCS.” (b) “We assessed our governance posture against ARCS.” (c) “This document cites ARCS Control LIF-03.” (d) “This system implements selected ARCS controls.” (e) “Our record governance framework maps to the ARCS-LIF and ARCS-CUS control families.”

Such use must be truthful, must use only so much of the mark as reasonably necessary, must not imply that Vega Commons Project, Inc. reviewed, approved, certified, endorsed, or sponsors the user or offering, and must not use the ARCS logo.

The following exceed referential use: “ARCS-Certified Platform” (requires authorization under Section 5.3); “ARCS Level 4 Compliant” without a conformance statement prepared and maintained in accordance with Section 5.2; use of the ARCS logo on a product page or marketing material (requires authorization under Section 5.3).

5. Conformance and Alignment Claims

Because ARCS includes a published conformance structure, use of ARCS in conformance language is governed as follows.

5.1 Claims Permitted Without Prior Approval

A party may make factual, non-endorsing statements such as: “assessed against ARCS,” “mapped to ARCS,” “designed with reference to ARCS,” “implements selected ARCS controls,” or “aligned to ARCS control concepts.” These statements must not imply review, endorsement, validation, or certification by Vega Commons Project, Inc.

5.2 Self-Declared Conformance Claims

A party may make a self-declared conformance claim only if all of the following are true: (a) the claim identifies the specific ARCS version; (b) the claim identifies the specific claimed conformance level, where applicable; (c) the claim is made pursuant to the published ARCS self-assessment or conformance procedure then in effect; (d) the claimant maintains written records sufficient to substantiate the claim, including a conformance statement prepared in accordance with Standard Annex H; (e) the claim clearly states that it is self-declared and not reviewed, certified, or endorsed by Vega Commons Project, Inc.; (f) the claim does not use the ARCS logo or any certification-style badge unless separately authorized; (g) where the ARCS standard requires independent assessment at the claimed conformance level, the claim is not made on a self-declared basis.

Self-declared conformance to ARCS v1.0, Level 3. This claim has not been reviewed, certified, or endorsed by Vega Commons Project, Inc.

5.3 Claims Requiring Written Authorization

The following require prior written authorization from Vega Commons Project, Inc.: (a) use of the ARCS logo; (b) “ARCS certified”; (c) “ARCS approved”; (d) “official ARCS implementation”; (e) “validated by ARCS”; (f) any badge, seal, emblem, or graphic implying official validation; (g) any statement implying that Vega Commons Project, Inc. reviewed, verified, endorsed, approved, or sponsors the claimant or offering; (h) use of the ARCS marks in a product name, service name, or organizational name; (i) offering services described as “ARCS certification,” “ARCS audit,” or “official ARCS assessment” where the service description implies VCP affiliation or authority; (j) issuing conformance certificates, badges, seals, or other credentials that use the ARCS marks.

Organizations seeking authorization should contact Vega Commons Project, Inc. at info@arcsstandard.org · info@vegacommons.org.

5.4 Accuracy and Currency Obligations

Self-declared conformance claims must remain accurate. If the assessed system undergoes material changes that affect the governance posture documented in the conformance statement, the organization must either update its assessment or withdraw the conformance claim.

6. Prohibited Uses

The following uses are prohibited: (a) use of ARCS as part of a product, company, service, or framework name in a manner likely to cause confusion as to source; (b) use of ARCS in a domain name, account name, or branding presentation likely to imply official status; (c) use of the ARCS logo without written permission; (d) use of ARCS in a manner that falsely implies conformance, certification, endorsement, sponsorship, or affiliation; (e) use of ARCS to label a modified, forked, or unofficial standard text as if it were the official standard; (f) any misleading, deceptive, unlawful, or defamatory use of the ARCS marks.

7. Required Disclaimer for Self-Declared Conformance

A self-declared conformance claim must appear with the following disclaimer, or materially equivalent language, in reasonable proximity:

“This is a self-declared conformance statement and has not been reviewed, certified, or endorsed by Vega Commons Project, Inc.”

8. Modification

Vega Commons Project, Inc. may modify this policy at any time. Modified versions will be published at arcsstandard.org.

9. Reservation of Rights

Vega Commons Project, Inc. reserves the right to object to any use of the ARCS marks that is misleading, confusing, inaccurate, or inconsistent with the integrity or status structure of the standard. VCP will address misuse proportionally. No license is granted except as expressly stated in this policy.

10. Contact

Vega Commons Project, Inc. · info@arcsstandard.org · info@vegacommons.org

ARCS Document Use Policy

Version 1.0 · Effective 2026 · Vega Commons Project, Inc.

1. Purpose

This policy governs use of the text of the Automated Record Custody Standard and related official ARCS publication materials. Its purpose is to support reading, citation, reference, and implementation of ARCS while preserving the integrity of the canonical text.

2. Covered Materials

This policy applies to official ARCS publication materials released by Vega Commons Project, Inc., including the core standard text, annexes, control statements, definitions, explanatory publication text, official diagrams, tables, and figures, and official ARCS web publication pages. This policy does not grant trademark rights. Statements regarding conformance, compliance, or assessment status are governed by the ARCS Trademark Policy.

3. Permitted Uses

Without prior written permission, any person or organization may: (a) read, download, store, and use ARCS materials for internal reference, research, education, implementation, governance design, audit preparation, or policy development; (b) cite ARCS and quote reasonable portions for commentary, analysis, implementation documentation, internal policies, legal or regulatory submissions, academic work, training materials, or comparative evaluation, provided the source is identified; (c) refer to ARCS provisions by control identifier, family identifier, section number, or annex number; (d) implement the ideas, control concepts, structures, classifications, and governance approaches described in ARCS in software, services, organizational policies, assessments, or operational systems; (e) link to the official ARCS publication and describe it accurately; (f) redistribute complete, unmodified copies of ARCS Documents, provided the copyright notice and this Document Use Policy are included with the copy, and the copy is not sold or distributed for a fee beyond reasonable reproduction costs; (g) complete the conformance templates published as part of the standard with organization-specific information for purposes of self-assessment or independent assessment.

4. Uses Requiring Prior Written Permission

The following require prior written permission from Vega Commons Project, Inc.: (a) republication of the full ARCS text or substantially all of the ARCS text; (b) public distribution of edited, annotated, modified, adapted, or translated versions of the ARCS text; (c) incorporation of substantial portions of the ARCS text into another public standard, framework, or commercial governance product; (d) creation and public distribution of derivative standards documents based substantially on the ARCS text; (e) public use of official ARCS figures, tables, or diagrams in a manner suggesting official status or affiliation, except where fair quotation or citation otherwise applies; (f) systematic automated extraction of the standard text for purposes of training machine learning models, populating databases for resale, or building products derived from the text.

The restrictions in this section do not apply to: reproduction of individual control identifiers and their short descriptions in compliance mapping documents, provided attribution to ARCS and VCP is included; reproduction of completed conformance templates filled in with the user’s own assessment data; or implementation guides, tutorials, and crosswalk documents that reference controls by identifier rather than reproducing control text.

5. Conditions on Permitted Use

Where this policy permits quotation, citation, or reference, the user must: (a) provide attribution to Vega Commons Project, Inc.; (b) preserve copyright notices on official copies; (c) not misrepresent unofficial material as the official ARCS text; (d) not imply endorsement, certification, sponsorship, or affiliation; (e) comply with the ARCS Trademark Policy when using ARCS names or designations.

6. No Public Fork of the Official Text

No person may publish a modified, abridged, forked, or adapted version of the ARCS text under the ARCS name, or in a manner likely to cause confusion between the official text and unofficial material.

7. Implementation Permitted; Text Extraction Restricted

This policy permits implementation of ARCS concepts. It does not permit extraction and republication of substantial portions of the ARCS text for incorporation into a competing framework, standard, or product documentation set without prior written permission.

8. Ownership of Conformance Documentation

Organizations that produce conformance statements, record surface maps, custody surface maps, configuration matrices, and other assessment documentation for their own systems own those documents. VCP claims no ownership interest in conformance documentation produced by implementing organizations.

9. Policy Rationale

This policy permits implementation and broad reference use without requiring a license agreement. The restrictions on republication, derivative works, and extraction preserve VCP’s ability to maintain a single, authoritative version and to prevent fragmentation before the standard has established sufficient adoption to make fragmentation self-correcting. VCP intends to evaluate these restrictions periodically and to relax them as the standard gains institutional adoption.

10. Copyright

11. Modification

Vega Commons Project, Inc. may modify this policy at any time. Modified versions will be published at arcsstandard.org. Uses commenced under a prior version of this policy in compliance with its terms are not retroactively restricted by modifications.

12. Contact

Vega Commons Project, Inc. · info@arcsstandard.org · info@vegacommons.org