Ҥ 124. Collection of demographic information for patent inventors

“(a) Voluntary collection.—The Director shall provide for the collection of demographic information, including gender, race, military or veteran status, and any other demographic category that the Director determines appropriate, related to each inventor residing in the United States who is listed with an application for patent, that may be submitted voluntarily by that inventor.

“(b) Protection of information.—The Director shall—

“(1) keep any information submitted under subsection (a) confidential and separate from the application for patent; and

“(2) establish appropriate procedures to ensure—

“(A) the confidentiality of any information submitted under subsection (a); and

“(B) that demographic information is not made available to examiners or considered in the examination of any application for patent.

“(c) Direct submission by inventors.—

“(1) IN GENERAL.—In carrying out subsection (a), the Director is authorized to implement a system to collect demographic information directly from an inventor on a voluntary basis.

“(2) AVOIDING REPEATED COLLECTION.—In implementing a system under paragraph (1), the Director shall make reasonable efforts to design the system to avoid repeated collection of the same information from each inventor on subsequent applications for patents.

“(3) COLLECTION OF CONTACT INFORMATION.—In implementing a system under paragraph (1), the Director shall design the system to capture the information necessary to directly reach inventors.

“(d) Relation to other laws.—

“(1) FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT.—Any demographic information submitted under subsection (a) shall be exempt from disclosure under section 552(b)(3) of title 5.

“(2) FEDERAL INFORMATION POLICY LAW.—Subchapter I of chapter 35 of title 44 shall not apply to the collection of demographic information under subsection (a).

“(e) Publication of demographic information.—

“(1) REPORT REQUIRED.—Not later than 18 months after the date on which the Director publishes in the Federal Register a notice relating to the demographic information described in subsection (a), in accordance with section 552a(e)(4) of title 5, and not later than January 31 of each year thereafter, the Director shall make publicly available a report that, except as provided in paragraph (3)—

“(A) includes the total number of patent applications filed during the previous year disaggregated—

“(i) by demographic information described in subsection (a); and

“(ii) by technology class number, technology class title, and State of residence of the inventor in the United States;

“(B) includes the total number of patents issued during the previous year disaggregated—

“(i) by demographic information described in subsection (a); and

“(ii) by technology class number, technology class title, and State of residence of the inventor in the United States; and

“(C) includes a discussion of the data collection methodology and summaries of the aggregate responses.

“(2) DATA AVAILABILITY.—In conjunction with issuance of the report under paragraph (1), the Director shall make publicly available data based on the demographic information collected under subsection (a) that, except as provided in paragraph (3), allows the information to be cross-tabulated to review subgroups.

“(3) PRIVACY.—The Director, in making publicly available the report under paragraph (1) and the data under paragraph (2)—

“(A) subject to subparagraph (B) of this paragraph, shall anonymize any personally identifying information related to the demographic information collected under subsection (a); and

“(B) may omit any personally identifying information that cannot reasonably be anonymized.

“(f) Biennial report.—Not later than 2 years after the date on which the Director publishes in the Federal Register a notice relating to the demographic information described in subsection (a), in accordance with section 552a(e)(4) of title 5, and not later than March 31 of every other year thereafter, the Director shall submit to Congress a biennial report that evaluates the data collection process under this section, ease of access to the information by the public, and recommendations on how to improve data collection.”.