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Violation of terms
I have built my company on ethics, honesty and fair business practices.
However, we it comes to customers clearly violating our terms and use our services against our values I really feel confused.
When a customer keeps violating our terms for years and hiding the violations inside a members only area of the site, then when that same customer requests support to fix some database tables, we discover he was using his website all those years to publish and discuss erotic contents! Something that clearly violates our terms, ethics and business principles, we had to terminate the account "as per our terms".
What will you do in the same situation? Do you believe that terms of service or just words to be ignored or a binding agreement?
Comments
Meanwhile... Im questioning your "ethics" Discovering your clients data!
You manage and fix it, but you should close your eyes when it comes to clients data.
I believe sexual keywords are not considered confidential data. Specially if they were on the table you are trying to fix and they are against your terms.
What if your customer is SPAMMING? Won't you read the SPAM emails in order to verify if it can be considered SPAM or not?
If you have a fair judgment please do, if you don't, then I don't need your comments.
Spamming? no not going to READ them.
Isn't that just a coincidence 1 you discovered, or you going to scan ALL your clients the similar thing (looking into their files and databases) just to make sure there is no one violate your terms?
Not arguing your ToS / AuP, but banning after "discovering" clients files and database is just wrong!
There's being nice and then there's taking the piss.
When I ran a shared hosting business, if people abused our terms and conditions or sending spam, we warned them. If they did it the next time, we backup'd their account, uploaded it to a secure area only them and us knew, and then removed their account, refunded the difference and gave them their backup. They'd have 24 hours before it was removed.
Now you could do the same refund them the difference (remainder) or if your terms and conditions says "no refund for abusing the terms and conditions" then tough stick your shoes into the ground and say no.
Your terms are there to protect you and the client if they refuse to read them then that's their loss.
Well, was this content illegal? Like underage stuff? That's one thing and should result in immediate termination. If it's just something you object to morally (sounds like), you should open a ticket and explain giving them some time (a week or so) to move off your services.
If in the terms it says "no adult content allowed" that means anything Adult related.
I also believe he's warned the client before:
Yes, our first warnings were sent during 2012, because of adult picture on the forum login page, other areas of the forum were closed. So the customer removed the picture, and we asked him to review our terms and remove any violating contents inside the members area.
That was almost 3 years ago.
We kept the customer on our servers in good intention, until last week he asked for support, and we discovered that he didn't comply with our terms since our warnings 3 years ago!
I believe this clears any confusions.
if you believe that customer is violating the the TOS of your company have a conversation via ticket or email then give him his data and give him some time a day or two to move his site to some one
If you view customers data without his consent i would probably say its not the right thing to do even if you suspect his breaking the ToS. Having a conversation via ticket might be the better thing to do before snooping around their data.
@arminds does your life get negatively impacted in any way at all from what your customer is hosting? If not then just shutup and take his money.
Merry Christmas.
"Morals" "ethics" tell me which means you invade a customers privacy?
I don't think either means invade privacy.
Added you on my will never use provider list.
I do agree somewhat with the OP. and disagree somewhat. Every Provider is responsible for the data hosted on their servers. And I doubt such content would be a crime or cause the provider any hassle. So as someone else said shut up and take his money!
I have myself saw content hosted by clients that seems somewhat shady. but I don't do anything as they pay me money and the content is not against the ToS as others said you don't look at what they host. Don't get me wrong if it was CP or anything related to Terrorism then I'd do something but not for Legal Adult Content.
I do get that you gave the client a warning and it is your choice to terminate him. But I'd not do that with a Long Term client who has been with you for a couple of years. Does the Location you host in have any laws relating to Hosting Adult content. why not move him to another network who are less strict. Don't see how it's business ethics it's only a bit of nudity / erotic content we are all Human.
If you believe violating our terms doesn't give us any rights, then please keep us on that "never-use" list.
And again, it was discovered by coincidence and reported internally to take action. Not by invading customer's privacy.
Please read our comments first. I said we warned the customer 3 years ago based on contents already published online.
And it was discovered by coincidence while fixing that table. Then reported internally. I am not defending our procedures, this is just to clear things up.
Is Adult Content against the law in the Country you Host in. and you are telling me that you personally have something wrong with Adult Content. And clearly implying you have never watched porn before? Lol
Providers will not allow Adult Content / IRC due to it's a DDoS Risk unless it's against the law in the country that you host the services in.
Thanks a lot for being fair and reasonable.
Many providers will suspend/terminate accounts for SPAMMING, hosting contents related to hate speech, racism, terrorism, gambling, hacking, torrents and for us "adult contents" as well. How will they discover those violations? It is either by viewing the site online, getting abuse complaints via tickets or by coincidence while providing support for the customer.
In our case we discovered it in 2012 by viewing the site online, then after the customer intentionally hidden the violating contents, we sent a warning and kept the customer on our servers considering he doesn't have bad intentions. But he didn't comply even after 3 years. We only found that on a table that includes forum categories and members ranking. It was related to erotic activities. No confidential data here or invasion of customer privacy.
Call us religious or ethical, in all cases we take seriously any contents listed on our TOS to be forbidden.
I know what you said I read the Thread I don't read between the lines like some other people and jump to conclusions.
But is it against the law to host adult content in the Country that the servers are located?
"Discovered in coincidence" ..... While you were invading customer privacy? Ok, sure.
Added a new rule to drop your website and subnet from my firewall
Ignore the ones here trying to start a fight. Not worth it I've learnt my lessons here.
And my only post to GCat, if you are helping a client and spot something in the table or database you are fixing how is that invading their privacy? They want help, you didn't just pop your head in and spot it. And many hosts don't allow Adult content for example, in LiteSpeed terms and conditions: https://www.litespeedtech.com/docs/webserver/license-enterprise
nontransferable license to use the SOFTWARE PRODUCT and documentation on
a computer for which you have paid the corresponding fee. You may not use
the SOFTWARE PRODUCT for any illegal activity or to host pornographic
content.
So if they get a abuse report that Adult content is being used on their software they have the right to void and cancel the license because you agreed to it when you installed it. So any hosts using LiteSpeed would not be allowed to host Porn content on their servers with it.
That's just like going to Mr. Lube and asking for them to change your tires but they do the transmission fluid as well.
You didn't ask them to do the transmission, but they did it anyway without your approval.
I am not fully sure how you can coincidently find a table with such information. I hope it was at least a web hosting and not a vps/dedicated server customer.
Ok now my last reply.
No that's if you get help to fix a database and you do something else and break the database.
The correct comparison is you go to a Tire company to get a new tire and they find out you don't have Road Tax and report you to the DVLA (Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency). But again that's because it's against the law. In this situation what that client is doing wrong is against the web host's terms and conditions (An electronic contract which is the legal document in this case).
This one guy company seems have lots of time in his desktop and hobby managing vpses, that's why he offers fully managed vpses (well worth $100 of his time of course).
One time, when he manage/fixing one of his client by "coincidence" he found a lottery ticket! and say hey its not belongs to you its on my server, you have no rights!
And next time he will keep looking on other clients vps, in case he found another lotto ^_^.
Im done here, Merry Christmas everyone
It was shared hosting yes.
Good advice. They are just pointless.
It all boils down to what you value more. Your reasoning for not allowing the content via your TOS, or the clients business. If the reasoning is based on upstream or legal issues, suspension/termination may be the best course of action. If it is based on moral or other personal reasons, it may be better to attempt to work out a solution with the client at first.
What's the point of a ToS if you aren't going to enforce it? Where do you draw the line? "Fair-use" spamming?
A good provider wouldn't instantly throw all data out the window, but you are completely justified in terminating your customers contract if they really do violate your ToS. Give them notice and sufficient time to download their data, then terminate the contract. Refund them for the remaining time left on their plan if you feel its fair.
Silly liberals and bleeding hearts will try to tell you that business owners should ignore their conscience and allow anything, but I believe that no one should ever be forced to participate in something that violates their conscience. Your customer was presented a ToS on sign up, they agreed to it. You didn't illegally break into their data, you came across it during an admin job that your client requested.
Give them notice, allow them to download their data, then show them the door.
The type of answer I was expecting for my question. A reasonable and fair one.
Thanks a lot.
Whether it is or not doesn't matter, the host is allowed to enforce their own terms and policies which customers agree to when ordering.
If the customer breaks their terms the host is fully within their rights to boot the customer.
Invading is a big word, if it was discovered while doing a job requested by the customer, like he says, I don't see there being any problem.
Let's create a scenario here, in this scenario you work for a company that does cleaning work for houses, if you find a dead body are you going to report it to the police or are you going to say "I shouldn't, I would be invading their privacy"?