Checking a Hosting Abuse Policy

Most hosts have a policy that sets out what they’ll do if you abuse their services.

Let’s look at some terms we commonly see in these policies.

Abuse Terms and Conditions

When glancing through an abuse policy, check for the following items and see what the policy has to say about them:

• Spam should not be tolerated. That includes email and web spam. See if there’s a cap on the number of emails you can send per day.
• Adult Content is sometimes allowed. There may be boundaries or limits on what’s tolerated. If you have questions about your specific situation, ask before signing up.
• Scripts and software may be restricted. Things such as chatrooms, instant messaging services, etc. are usually not allowed because they eat up a great deal of resources.
• Misuse of resources should be clearly defined. This is less of an issue with dedicated or VPS hosting and is more geared towards shared hosting customers.
• Copyrights and trademarks should be enforced. But make sure that there is a fair warning policy for one-off cases of infringement.

Other Terms to Check

Ask questions about your host. The sales staff should be trained to field any questions about their policies.

Think about the different types of content you might want to include and whether your host will object.