HostM’s Acceptable Use Policy (“AUP”) is provided to give our customers and users a clear understanding of what HostM expects of them while using the service. All users of HostM’s Services: those who access some of our Services but do not have accounts, as well as those who pay a service fee to subscribe to the Services, must comply with this AUP and our Terms of Service (“TOS”).
This AUP is an addendum to the TOS between the Supplier and the Client, hereafter referred to as the Parties. Use of HostM’s Services constitutes acceptance and agreement to HostM’s AUP as well as HostM’s TOS (Terms of Service).
We support the uncensored flow of information and ideas over the Internet and do not actively monitor subscriber activity under normal circumstances. Similarly, we do not exercise editorial control over the content of any web site, e-mail transmission, newsgroups, or other material created or accessible over or through the services, except for certain proprietary Web sites. However, in accordance with our TOS, we may remove, block, or otherwise restrict any data, or terminate, suspend, or otherwise restrict any activity that, in our sole discretion, may be illegal, may subject us to liability, or which may violate this AUP. HostM may cooperate with legal authorities and/or third parties in the investigation of any suspected or alleged crime or civil wrongdoing. Your violation of this AUP may result in the suspension or immediate termination of either your HostM account or other actions as detailed in Section 3 WITHOUT PRIOR NOTICE.
This document is intended to provide a basic understand of HostM’s Acceptable Use Policy. The following are guidelines for the establishment and enforcement of HostM’s AUP:
Ensure reliable service to our customers
Ensure security and privacy of our systems and network, as well as the networks and systems of others
Comply with existing laws
Maintain our reputation as a responsible service provider
Encourage responsible use of the Internet and discourage activities which reduce the usability and value of Internet services
Preserve the value of Internet resources as a conduit for free expression and exchange of information
Preserve the privacy and security of individual users
HostM intends to provide its customers access to everything the Internet has to offer. While the HostM is firmly committed to the principles of free speech, certain activities that may be damaging to the resources of both the HostM and the Internet and cannot be permitted under the guise of free speech. The resources of the HostM and the Internet are limited, and abuse of these resources by one user has a negative impact on the entire community.
We do not routinely monitor the activity of accounts except for measurements of system utilization and the preparation of billing records. However, in our efforts to promote good citizenship within the Internet community, we will respond appropriately if we become aware of inappropriate use of our service.
You may not use your virtual site to publish material, which HostM determines, at its sole discretion, to be unlawful, indecent or objectionable. For purposes of this policy, "material" refers to all forms of communications including narrative descriptions, graphics (including photographs, illustrations, images, drawings, logos), executable programs, video recordings, and audio recordings.
If a HostM account is used to violate the Acceptable Use Policy or our TOS, we reserve the right to terminate your service without notice. We prefer to advise customers of inappropriate behavior and any necessary corrective action, however, flagrant violations of the Acceptable Use Policy will result in immediate termination of service. Our failure to enforce this policy, for whatever reason, shall not be construed as a waiver of our right to do so at any time.
As a member of our network community, you must use your Internet access responsibly. If you have any questions regarding this policy, please contact us via our web site.
VIOLATIONS OF HOSTM ACCEPTABLE USE POLICY
The following constitute violations of this AUP:
Illegal use: HostM’s services may not be used for illegal purposes, or in support of illegal activities. Transmission, storage, or presentation of any information, data or material in violation of any United States Federal, State or City law or European Union law is prohibited. This is also true for sites that promote any illegal activity or content that may be damaging to our servers or any other server on the internet. Links to such materials are prohibited. This also includes, but not limited to Adult sites, pirated software, hacker programs/archives, MP3, Warez, copyrighted material or material protected by trade secrets and other statutes. HostM is not responsible for any claims resulting from the use of our service. HostM reserves the right to cooperate with legal authorities and/or injured third parties in the investigation of any suspected crime or civil wrongdoing.
Harm to minors: Use of the HostM service to harm, or attempt to harm, minors in any way, including, but not limited to child pornography.
Threats: Use of the HostM service to transmit any material (by e-mail, uploading, posting or otherwise) that threatens or encourages bodily harm or destruction of property.
Violation of Privacy, Defamation, or Harassment: Use of the HostM service to transmit any material (by e-mail, uploading, posting or otherwise) that violates the lawful privacy rights of an individual, contains defamatory or libelous statements, or that harasses an invididual. HostM maintains sole discretion in determining the occurrence of such a violation.
Fraudulent activity: Use of HostM service to make fraudulent offers to sell or buy products, items, or services, or to advance any type of financial scam such as "pyramid schemes," "ponzi schemes," and "chain letters."
Forgery or impersonation: Adding, removing or modifying identifying network header information in an effort to deceive or mislead is prohibited. Attempting to impersonate any person by using forged headers or other identifying infrmation is prohibited. The use of anonymous remailers or nicknames does not constitute impersonation.
Unsolicited commercial e-mail / Unsolicited bulk e-mail (SPAM): Use of the HostM service to transmit any unsolicited commercial or unsolicited bulk e-mail is expressly prohibited. Violations of this type will result in the immediate termination of the offending HostM account. Virtual sites that support spammers or cause any of our IP space to be listed in any of the various Spam Databases will have their account immediately removed from our server. Severe violations may result in immediate and permanent removal of the account from our server without notice to the customer. Any account guilty of a second violation WILL be immediately and permanently removed from our server without notice.
E-mail/News Bombing: Malicious intent to impede another person's use of electronic mail services or news will result in the immediate termination of the offending HostM account.
E-mail/Message Forging: Forging any message header, in part or whole, of any electronic transmission, originating or passing through the HostM service is in violation of this AUP.
Incorrect Nameservers: All domains hosted on our network must utilize the correct nameservers as provided in our instructions. All hosted data including email and websites for domains that do not utilize the correct nameservers is routinely and permanently removed by our security system.
Personal/Group Data Backups, Private/Small/Large Workgroups, and File Sharing/Transfers/Storage/Syncing: The customer agrees to make use of our web hosting service solely for the purpose of hosting publicly available legal websites and associated email functions. Any data uploaded or stored within the account must be for this purpose. Stored data must be used directly (not just linked to) by publicly accessible websites hosted within the account.
For example, images must be web optimized so as to load directly within such web pages. As such, image files larger than typical web-optimized files are more likely to trigger our anti-abuse filters, and may cause the hosting account to be excluded from the Daily Backups to ensure system efficiency. Videos should be hosted on a video hosting service, even if they are embedded on web pages hosted on your hosting account.
HostM servers are not intended to be used for private/small/large workgroup activity (e.g. photo albums, file repositories, client demos/showcases/downloads, etc.), personal/group data backup, temporary storage, archiving or syncing, including data storage through the use of large/numerous email attachments, public FTP, database dumps, and account backups. In addition, no warez, serialz, cracks, disc images, copyrighted material by third-parties, or any other illegal material is allowed on HostM servers.
Hosting data backups can and should be made regularly. However, any backup files that are created within the hosting account, once completed, should be immediately transferred out of and then removed from the hosting account.
Similarly, users should strive to ensure that they have only one copy of their data on their hosting accounts. Duplicate data, including that utilized by and located across multiple websites or folders, may not allowed should they cause significant issues such as unnecessarily long malware scanning, system backups and restorations. These and other features may be disabled on affected accounts to ensure system stability.
Any other data structuring or account activity that causes unnecessarily long malware scanning, system backups and restorations, may likewise be disallowed, or cause these and other features to be disabled on affected accounts to ensure system stability.
HostM reserves the right to remove without notification any data that is deemed to violate our policies or otherwise unsuitable for our hosting environment. In addition, the affected account(s) may be subject to immediate suspension or termination without refund.
Spam Complaints: All outgoing email messages (including forwarded messages) must not result in any spam complaints whatsoever from any of the email recipients. A good way of minimizing the chance of this happening is to ensure that all email addresses are double opt-in, i.e. have each recipient utilize a sign-up mechanism for the list, which should clearly describe the kind and frequency of email messages recipients can expect to receive, and then upon sign-up, an automated email should be sent out with a verification link requesting confirmation. Only if the recipient clicks the verification link, should the recipient's email address be added to the mailing list.
Any spam or abuse complaints received may result in restrictions being placed on the offending email address and/or hosting account, including possible suspension and/or termination without notice, at the sole discretion of HostM.
Usenet SPAMing: HostM has a zero tolerance policy for the use of its network for the posting of messages or commercial advertisements, which violate the rules, regulations, FAQ or charter of any newsgroups or mailing list. Commercial messages that are appropriate under the rules of a newsgroup or mailing list or that are solicited by the recipients are permitted.
Unauthorized access: Use of the HostM service to access, or to attempt to access, the accounts of others, or to penetrate, or attempt to penetrate, security measures of HostM’s or another entity's computer software or hardware, electronic communications system, or telecommunications system, whether or not the intrusion results in the corruption or loss of data, is expressly prohibited and the offending HostM account is subject to immediate termination.
Copyright or trademark infringement: Use of the HostM service to transmit any material (by e-mail, uploading, posting or otherwise) that infringes any copyright, trademark, patent, trade secret or other proprietary rights of any third party, including, but not limited to, the unauthorized copying of copyrighted material, the digitization and distribution of photographs from magazines, books, or other copyrighted sources, and the unauthorized transmittal of copyrighted software.
Collection of personal data: Use of the HostM service to collect, or attempt to collect, personal information about third parties without their knowledge or consent.
Network disruptions and unfriendly activity: Use of the HostM service for any activity which affects the ability of other people or systems to use HostM Services or the Internet. This includes "denial of service" (DOS) attacks against another network host or individual user. Interference with or disruption of other network users, services or equipment is prohibited. It is the Member's responsibility to ensure that their network is configured in a secure manner. A Subscriber may not, through action or inaction, allow others to use their network for illegal or inappropriate actions. A Subscriber may not permit their network, through action or inaction, to be configured in such a way that gives a third party the capability to use their network in an illegal or inappropriate manner. Unauthorized entry and/or use of another company and/or individual's computer system will result in immediate account termination. HostM will not tolerate any subscriber attempting to access the accounts of others, or penetrate security measures of other systems, whether or not the intrusion results in corruption or loss of data.
Server abuse: Any attempts to undermine or cause harm to any Company server or customer of ours is strictly prohibited. HostM holds no responsibility for the use of our clients' accounts. Any account that abuses resources and actions are not taken to desist, calls for immediate de-activation without any refund of payments made thus far. Any site using what we deem to be using excessive cpu cycles or any resources that cause strain to other sites may be de-activated immediately without prior warning. This includes activity that may not be within the customer's control, such as, but not limited to, "denial of service" (DOS) attacks targetting the customer's account, and excessive hotlinking of images or other files via external sources. Use of our service to access, or to attempt to access, the accounts of others, or to penetrate, or attempt to penetrate, security measures of our or another entity's computer software or hardware, electronic communications system, or telecommunications system.
Fraud: Involves a knowing misrepresentation or misleading statement, writing or activity made with the intent that the person receiving it will act upon it.
Infringement of Copyright, Patent, Trademark, Trade Secret, or Intellectual Property Right: Distribution and/or posting of copyrighted or the aforementioned infringements will not be tolerated.
Distribution of Viruses: Intentional distributions of software that attempts to and/or causes damage, harassment, or annoyance to persons, data, and/or computer systems are prohibited. Such an offense will result in the immediate termination of the offending account.
Inappropriate Use of Software: Use of software or any device that would facilitate a continued connection, i.e. pinging, while using HostM services could result in termination of service. Programs are not allowed to run continually in the background. This is to minimize system resources used and operational maintenance needed. Chat or topsite programs are not allowed on our servers other than the ones we pre-install for our clients to use. The following forum software are not allowed to be installed in our servers: Yabb and Ultimate Bulletin Board (UBB).
Third Party Accountability: HostM subscribers will be held responsible and accountable for any activity by third parties, using their account, that violates guidelines created within the Acceptable Use Policy.
Violation Of Use of Hosting Accounts: It is absolutely forbidden to host pornographic/adult content, sites linking to adult/pornographic content, IRC clients, IRC bots, IRC servers, anonymouse proxies, gaming and RPG (Role Playing Games)-related content (this includes mods and clan sites) on all hosting accounts. Any accounts found hosting this material will be subject to immediate cancellation without refund.
IRC networks: It is absolutely forbidden to host an IRC server that is part of or connected to another IRC network or server. Accounts found to be connecting to or part of these networks will be immediately removed from our network without notice.
Security
You are responsible for any misuse of your account, even if the inappropriate activity was committed by a friend, family member, guest or employee. Therefore, you must take steps to ensure that others do not gain unauthorized access to your account. In addition, you may not use your account to breach security of another account or attempt to gain unauthorized access to another network or server.
Your password provides access to your account. It is your responsibility to keep your password secure.
Sharing your password and account access with unauthorized users is prohibited. You should take care to prevent others from using your account since you will be held responsible for such use.
Attempting to obtain another user's account password is strictly prohibited, and may result in termination of service.
You must adopt adequate security measures to prevent or minimize unauthorized use of your account. This includes being aware of the possible causes of account compromise and taking any necessary steps to ensure the security of your hosting accounts, websites and email. Any malware, malicious activity, or compromise detected on your hosting accounts, websites, and email, including those caused by unauthorized use of your account, is not allowed and can lead to various actions taken to put a stop to this, including but not limited to the forced updating and/or fresh replacement of apps, themes, plugins, and other items in your account to close known security holes and remove existing infections, as well as the suspension or termination of some or all services.
You may not attempt to circumvent user authentication or security of any host, network or account. This includes, but is not limited to, accessing data not intended for you, logging into or making use of a server or account you are not expressly authorized to access, or probing the security of other networks. Use or distribution of tools designed for compromising security is prohibited. Examples of these tools include, but are not limited to, password guessing programs, cracking tools or network probing tools.
You may not attempt to interfere with service to any user, host or network ("denial of service attacks"). This includes, but is not limited to, "flooding" of networks, deliberate attempts to overload a service, and attempts to "crash" a host.
Users who violate systems or network security may incur criminal or civil liability. HostM will cooperate fully with investigations of violations of systems or network security at other sites, including cooperating with law enforcement authorities in the investigation of suspected criminal violations.
Network Performance
HostM accounts operate on shared resources. Excessive use or abuse of these shared network resources by one customer may have a negative impact on all other customers. Misuse of network resources in a manner which impairs network performance is prohibited by this policy and may result in termination of your account.
You are prohibited from excessive consumption of resources, including CPU time, memory, disk space and session time. You may not use resource-intensive programs which negatively impact other customers or the performances of HostM systems or networks. HostM reserves the right to terminate or limit such activities.
REPORTING VIOLATIONS OF HOSTM AUP
HostM requests that anyone who believes that there is a violation of this AUP direct the information to Client Care Service at: https://www.hostm.com/contact
If available, please provide the following information:
The IP address used to commit the alleged violation
The date and time of the alleged violation, including the time zone or offset from UTC
Evidence of the alleged violation
E-mail with full header information provides all of the above, as do system log files. Other situations will require different methods of providing the above information. HostM may take any one or more of the following actions in response to complaints:
Issue written or verbal warnings
Suspend the Member's newsgroup posting privileges
Suspend the Member's account
Terminate the Member's account
Bill the Member for administrative costs and/or reactivation charges
Bring legal action to enjoin violations and/or to collect damages, if any, cause by violations
REFUSAL OF SERVICE
We reserve the right to refuse, cancel, or suspend service at our sole discretion without refunds.
INFANCY
You attest that you are of legal age to enter into this Acceptable Use Policy.
Changes to this Acceptable Use Policy
HostM may update this Acceptable Use Policy from time to time, including to comply with changes to the law. Please frequently check this page to review any changes to this Acceptable Use Policy.