Creative Commons licenses allow authors and copyright holders to give the public permission to use copyrightable works for free under certain conditions. Each Creative Commons licence contains one or more of the four licensing elements that specify permitted uses:
Attribution (BY) is a core condition attached to all Creative Commons licenses and it means you have to credit the original creator and any other nominated parties;
Commercial use (NC) specifies whether others can use the work commercially;
Modify & adapt (ND) specifies if other people can make changes to the work;
Change license (SA) specifies if you can change the license type for your adaptation of the work.
There are six different combinations of licensing elements in the Creative Commons licensing family. The most permissive licence is CC BY. All other licences contain further restrictions; CC BY-NC-ND for instance allows neither modifications nor commercial use.
All six CC licenses have been translated into different languages. In the past, Creative Commons legally adapted licenses to specific national legislation. The newest 4.0 licenses are designed for use in jurisdictions around the world and are internationally enforceable. Europeana data providers may use Creative Commons licenses version 4.0 or earlier (3.0, 2.5, 2.1, 2.0, 1.0).