Answered By: FAQ Team
Last Updated: Apr 21, 2026     Views: 229

If you've clicked on an "Online access" link to an ebook on iDiscover to find that you're only given a message saying "The connection has timed out", you've probably found a link to an electronic legal deposit book. Many publishers are now fulfilling their legal deposit obligations by depositing electronic rather than print books with the six legal deposit libraries, including the UL.

You can spot an ELD ebook by the wording of the link from iDiscover: "Online access restricted to designated PCs in the main UL and affiliate libraries".

Electronic legal deposit books:

  • are only accessible on dedicated terminals around the University
  • are only ever available on a one concurrent user basis (one reader at a time across Cambridge)
  • may not be downloaded in any way (although printing is allowed with the usual copyright restrictions).

For more information, have a look at this blog post from ebooks@cambridge:
https://ebookscambridge.wordpress.com/2016/10/20/electronic-legal-deposit-and-ebooks/

Note: If the ebook is not electronic legal deposit content, please contact the ebooks@cambridge team on eresources@lib.cam.ac.uk who will investigate the issue for you. Please send title information and a screenshot of the error message if possible.

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