AllWorldIT – Terms of Service and Acceptable Use Policy

AllWorldIT is a world-wide leader in Hosting and Opensource Solutions.

These Terms of Service and Acceptable Use Policies apply to all individuals, businesses, organizations, resellers, and end-clients (collectively, “users”) employing any AllWorldIT service, hardware, property or other product.

Use of AllWorldIT resources constitutes acceptance of all policies in effect at the time of use. Modification to this policy may be made at any time and will be immediately effective upon posted changes.

AllWorldIT reserves the right to protect its resources, users, and reputation from any activity deemed damaging, offensive or abusive. To this measure, AllWorldIT will act as sole arbiter in determining violations of this policy.

1. Provisions:

1.1. Use of AllWorldIT services indicates the acknowledgment that:

1.1.1. Users are responsible for the security of accounts, systems, passwords, etc and will not hold AllWorldIT liable for any loss or damages caused by exploitation or any other misuse of AllWorldIT resources.
1.1.2. AllWorldIT is not responsible for any damages, anticipated or otherwise, caused by viewing materials, links, or other content posted to systems on the local network or linked via this network. All users agree to indemnify AllWorldIT from any claims resulting from any use of its services.
1.1.2. Adult content is sanctioned by applicable local and federal governments/laws. Legal adult content is permitted on all AllWorldIT product lines. The viewing, downloading, or possession of legal adult content by AllWorldIT users and other Internet viewers, is not governed by AllWorldIT policy, and is left to the discretion of individuals requesting this material.
1.1.3. AllWorldIT may monitor its network and audit systems for any data or activity indicating potential policy violations.
1.1.4. AllWorldIT reserves the right to deactivate/suspend or terminate any account without prior notice. If AllWorldIT deactivates/suspends or terminates an account due to the direct or indirect participation of users engaging in any activity which contravenes the provisions of this policy any right to a refund will be forfeited by the client/reseller in control of the account at the time of the violation. Furthermore, no refunds for advance payments will be granted for deactivated/suspended or terminated accounts. Critical offenses and involvement in illegal activity will negate any perceived obligation of AllWorldIT to return data.

2. Abusive Clientele:

2.1. AllWorldIT may, at its discretion, suspend or terminate the service of any client/reseller who is financially delinquent, abusive/harassing to AllWorldIT personnel, or causes general disruption to the operation of the company and service of its users. Examples of such activity include, but are not limited to:

2.1.1. Verbal or written abuse of AllWorldIT personnel (obscene language, threats, etc.).
2.1.2. Excessive complaints or persistent disregard for alerts, warnings, and/or notices.
2.1.3. Repeated reactivation of abusive users.
2.1.4. Consistent errors or administrative changes causing unnecessary workload.
2.1.5. Spamming and/or flooding AllWorldIT email addresses, live chat, ticket systems, and/or servers.
2.1.6. Frequent late or bounced payments.
2.1.7. Issuing chargebacks.
2.1.8. Public harassment or derogatory/false/exaggerated forum/discussion group postings.

3. Abuse of AllWorldIT Systems and Resources:

3.1. Abuse of AllWorldIT systems or resources will result in legal action, to the fullest extent allowed by law. This includes, but is not limited to:

3.1.1. Any damaging or abusive activity, whether unlawful or considered to be detrimental to the operations of AllWorldIT resources.
3.1.2. Any attempt to harm equipment owned by AllWorldIT, or hosted in its facilities.

4. Illegal Usage Restrictions:

4.1. Resources provided by AllWorldIT may be used only for lawful purposes. Examples of unlawful content include, but are not limited to:

4.1.1. Unlicensed hosting of, linking to, or any involvement in the transmission of copyrighted media, applications, published works, or any data protected by trade secret, without explicit rights to engage in this activity.
4.1.2. Child pornography and/or kidnapping material.
4.1.3. Content deemed to be terroristic in nature.
4.1.4. Material posted to incite violence or protest.
4.1.5. Violations of human and animal rights, including the display of acts of cruelty and other abuse.
4.1.6. Pyramid/ponzi schemes.
4.1.7. Fraudulent sites and other forms of “phishing” (emails/forms/sites used to gather personal information from unsuspecting individuals).
4.1.8. Cracking programs and/or key generators.
4.1.9. Violations of import/export restrictions.

5. Prohibited Usage Restrictions:

5.1. In addition to activities governed by law, AllWorldIT strictly prohibits:

5.1.1. IRC and associated applications (including bouncers, “bots”, etc.).
5.1.2. Malware (malicious software), botnets, hacked content or any content which to the determination of our abuse team may pose a security risk (including software with known vulnerabilities).
5.1.3. Automation tools, auto typers, macros and bots used to circumvent restrictions on games or other applications (e.g. RuneScape bots).
5.1.4. Network and systems abuse scripts.
5.1.5. Circumvention of and/or provision of instructions to circumvent security measures.
5.1.6. Unnecessary port scans.
5.1.7. Threatening, harassing, or obscene content.
5.1.8. Anonymizers/proxies (including open mail proxies, anonymous web surfing proxies, etc.).
5.1.9. Proxy detection scripts.
5.1.10. Unsolicited and/or mass advertising via forums, blogs, comment forms, and newsgroups.
5.1.11. Mail bombing, email address harvesting, and/or unsolicited email (including bulk mail sent to unconfirmed recipients and individual unsolicited advertisement or link exchange requests).
5.1.12. HYIPs (high-yield investment programs).
5.1.13. Excessive overutilization of resources.
5.1.14. Evasion of bans or blacklistings by changing domains/IPs or utilizing AllWorldIT services to facilitate ban evasion.
5.1.15. Any access of network resources by origins reported to be infected with viruses, trojans or utilizing/facilitating botnets

*** Links to any content in violation of 5.1 above is also prohibited.

6. Bulk Email & Blacklisting:

6.1. AllWorldIT understands that bulk email is an important mechanism for keeping people informed. However, spamming from the AllWorldIT network, and spamvertising (unsolicited advertising of) sites hosted on the AllWorldIT network, is prohibited.

6.2. Legitimate bulk email meets the following criteria:

6.2.1. ALL recipients have confirmed willingness to be added to a distribution list by clicking on confirmation links or (preferably) by responding to verification emails.
6.2.2. Distributed messages include valid headers, removal instructions, and information on the method by which the subscribed address was obtained.

6.3. The usage of partially confirmed recipient lists or third party lists is prohibited.

6.4. All bulk email senders must post privacy policies and must be clearly identified to recipients during the subscription and confirmation process.

6.5. If AllWorldIT approaches a client for evidence of confirmation, the request must be honored within 48 hours of the initial notification. Deactivation of an account or service may occur until proof of confirmation is provided and approved.

6.6. AllWorldIT reserves the right to suspend or terminate any services involved in the transmission of unsolicited email. An abuse fee may be levied for re-activation in terms of section 7.7 at the discretion of the AllWorldIT Abuse Dept.

6.7. If any activities lead to blacklisting, the involved client/reseller may be charged an abuse fee of $100.00.

7. Policy Violations:

7.1. Storage, presentation, or transmission of any material in violation of any laws, or otherwise prohibited by AllWorldIT, is cause for temporary account deactivation, server/service termination, or complete cancellation of all account services. The AllWorldIT Abuse Dept will make an attempt to contact the involved client via email when the first sign of a possible violation is noted. This notification may occur before or after a service is deactivated/suspended or terminated.

7.2. Alerts are provided as a courtesy. Prompt responses to alerts are required. When an alert is sent, the designated abuse contact is responsible for acknowledging his/her understanding of the offense and providing an adequate response, to the satisfaction of AllWorldIT, within 24 hours of the notice. Failure to sufficiently respond to an abuse alert will lead to deactivation/suspension or termination of any services involved in abusive activity and will result in a $75 abuse fee.

7.3. Repeated abuse or failure to sufficiently address abuse issues and prevent their recurrence will lead to deactivation/suspension or termination of any services involved in abusive activity. An abuse fee of $75 will be levied on the 3rd incident and each subsequent incident.

7.4. Note: It is extremely important to ensure that the abuse email address on record is valid and monitored at all times. This is the address used for abuse notifications and warnings. The address may be set within the client management interface.

7.5. Direct clients/resellers are fully responsible for any activity found to originate from products and/or services under their care. In any case involving unauthorized parties utilizing a AllWorldIT service for abuse, the direct client/reseller is responsible for locating and stopping all affected applications, until the source of the problem is found and removed. AllWorldIT may opt to deactivate/suspend all services until the client can perform such an investigation or the system can be secured or reinstalled. If the support of AllWorldIT is required for the investigation, the client agrees to compensate AllWorldIT at a rate of $75 USD/hour for such service. Reinstallations are performed at a flat-rate of $35 USD (which does not include any operating system changes or licensing costs).

7.6. Direct clients/resellers are responsible for maintaining secure systems. This includes, but is not limited to, ensuring only stable and secure software is being run in the environment provided.

7.7. Deliberate use of the AllWorldIT network in violation of the Terms of Service will result in immediate deactivation, suspension or termination of service. An abuse fee of $75 may be levied for re-activation at the discretion of the AllWorldIT Abuse Dept.

7.8. AllWorldIT will not be responsible for securing dedicated servers, virtualized systems, user accounts/web sites, or third-party applications. Direct clients/resellers with fully managed support services covered by SLA, may be entitled to a higher level of support than clientele with basic management.

7.9. If reactivation of any deactivated/suspended or terminated service is warranted, all abuse fees and any outstanding service fees must be paid prior to service being reactivated.

8. Resource Usage:

8.1. Resource usage should be maintained within levels outlined in product descriptions and/or service contracts. Abuse caused by users or unauthorized parties may increase resource usage and lead to overage fees or service deactivation/suspension/throttling.

8.2. AllWorldIT reserves the right to optimize and prioritize resource usage to prevent impact on clients.

9. Port Usage:

9.1. Dedicated/co-located servers and virtual systems are installed on 100MBPS unthrottled ports, unless service is sold with a specified port size (ie. 10MBPS UNMETERED) or specified/requested as a “capped” port.

9.2. AllWorldIT reserves the right to monitor network usage and throttle the available speed (if a service significantly exceeds average usage) to conserve network resources and to prevent any large billing anomalies. This will generally not include short spikes in usage, but will include, and not be limited to, sustained transfers of significantly larger than average amounts of bandwidth.

9.3. If at any time a clients’ or resellers’ data transfer rate affects other AllWorldIT clientele, AllWorldIT reserves the right to throttle and/or disconnect/deactivate/suspend the service at the source of the problem.

10. Filtering:

10.1. AllWorldIT reserves the right to optimize, block, filter, or throttle ports and/or IP address ranges. For example, this may include blocking Port 6667 (IRC), denying access from a known spammer’s IP address range, or limiting the speed of point-to-point file-sharing programs.

11. Idle Timeouts:

AllWorldIT may disconnect any idle connection to the network. Average timeouts are:

11.1. FTP – 300 seconds
11.2. Telnet/SSH – 2 hours

12. Support:

12.1. AllWorldIT provides clients with support primarily using our helpdesk system (http://helpdesk.iitsp.com), links to site-specific helpdesk systems are found on most of our websites. Ticket response times depend primarily on staff workload and averages between 5 and 30 minutes, but may during certain events extend up to 24hr, albeit rarely. The status of tickets can be viewed when logged into the helpdesk system.

12.2. Email support is provided using the email addresses on our various websites, when an email is sent to these addresses a ticket will be logged on our helpdesk system. If you do not receive a response within 5 minutes, please log into the helpdesk interface to log your support ticket. Failing this, please contact our support team via telephone.

12.3. Live chat support is provided on a best effort basis, time and workload permitting, no expectation should be made for instant responses. Please log a ticket using email or the helpdesk system if you don’t get a response in live chat.

12.4. All support is provided on a first come first serve basis unless a specific SLA exists.

12.5. Every effort is made to quickly publish and update network outages and notices.

13. Uptime Guarantee:

13.1. Should your service suffer a physical downtime exceeding our guarantee of 99.99% you may receive the equivalent of up to one months service fee in credit for the affected service.

13.2. Credit is approved at the discretion of AllWorldIT management and each application is considered on a case by case basis.

13.3. Third party monitoring services may not be used to substantiate downtime as many factors may affect these services including but not limited to the monitoring services’ network capacity or transit issues on other networks.

13.4. Uptime is defined as the ability to serve a response to a requestor under normal usage circumstances.

13.5. Downtime will be counted from the first support ticket received until service is restored.

13.6. To request a credit under the Uptime Guarantee, please send an email to sales@allworldit.com and include all relevant justification.

13.7. Downtime caused by excess resource usages is not covered by the Uptime Guarantee.

14. Disaster Recovery Backups and Data Loss:

14.1. AllWorldIT makes daily and weekly disk mirror backups, each backup overwrites the previous backup for the same period.

14.2. Restoring of individual accounts or files is not feasible as the entire image would need to be restored. The optional offsite backup service is designed to address this and should be used by any client requiring daily, weekly or monthly backups.

14.3. Disaster recovery exclusions:

14.3.1. Virtual private servers, dedicated servers, cloud servers do not form part of our disaster recovery backups. The client is responsible for backing up their system.
14.3.2. Accounts with more than 50,000 inodes will be excluded from disaster recovery backups.
14.3.2. Files over 250MByte will be excluded from disaster recovery backups.

14.3. Offsite backup options are available at an additional cost. The offsite backup service has no exclusions.

15. Non-Payment, Suspension and Service Termination:

15.1. Accounts not paid within 7 days of due date will be suspended and a non-refundable late payment fee of $5.00 will be charged. Re-activation will not occur until all outstanding fees have been settled.
15.2. Accounts not paid within 21 days of due date will be permanently deleted. Re-creation will only occur once all outstanding amounts have been settled in full.
15.3. It remains the sole responsibility of the client to ensure their account remains paid and in good standing and all contact details are kept up to date. Advisory reminders are not guaranteed but are sent as follows: (the history of emails sent can be found in your billing account “Emails” section)

First Unpaid Reminder: 3 days before due date
First Overdue Reminder: 1 day after due date
Second Overdue Reminder: 3 days after due date
Third Overdue Reminder: 5 days after due date
Suspension Notice: 7 days after due date
Late Fee Added: 7 days after due date
Termination Notice: 21 days after due date

16. Special Terms and Conditions – Website Hosting:

16.1. Each website hosting package is limited to the disk space and bandwidth allocation included with its associated package. To maintain the integrity of our service, the following usage may be limited or disallowed on website hosting packages:

16.1.1. Banner, graphic, or CGI scripts running from the service and/or being utilized on other domains/websites.
16.1.2. Large graphic or download archives/galleries.
16.1.3. Large chat room gatherings.

16.2. To reduce the load on a platforms, AllWorldIT reserves the right to relocate any site to a different server and/or IP address.

16.3. The following provisional hosting limits are in place per vhost:

16.3.1. PHP Processes: Max of 2 processes executing on 2 cores concurrently, subsequent requests will be queued.
16.3.1.1. Maximum execution time is set to 30 seconds.
16.3.2. PHP Memory: 128Mb per process.
16.3.3. Apache Connections: Maximum of 15 concurrent connections (subsequent connections will get HTTP error code 509). 50 connection per second limit (subsequent traffic will be dropped by our DDoS gear for up to 15 minutes).
16.3.4. Invalid Logins: Invalid logins are tracked across sites and precautions activated by our application firewall. Should traffic be classified in this way connections will get HTTP error code 503.
16.3.5. MySQL Connections: A maximum of 25 connections per account is allowed.

16.4. All accounts have an individual hard inode usage limit of 75,000 inodes. The use of more than 50,000 inodes on any account will result in an inode warning message. Accounts found to be exceeding 50,000 inodes will be automatically removed from our disaster recovery system to avoid the negative performance impact. Every file and directory placed in the home directory counts towards the inode usage. There are two primary causes of large inode counts: 1) it is possible the catchall email address is set to active, 2) it is possible the hosting account is making use of a caching system which does not clean up cache files

16.5. Software updates, insecure sites, end-of-life software. Security of our platforms is taken very seriously. Many clients run billing software, credit card processing solutions and other business critical operations from their hosting accounts, our platforms are expected to pass PCI-DSS compliance tests and ensure all data hosted remains secure.

16.5.1. Software updates are done daily. End of life packages will be updated to the latest secure supported version 6 months before end of life. Software update cycle: cPanel stable – automatic, Apache – automatic, PHP minor (X.minor.Y) – notified, PHP patch (X.Y.patch) – automatic, Softaculous – automatic, Fantastico – automatic, ASSP Deluxe – automatic, Other – automatic.
16.5.2. End-of-life software receives no security updates, puts the platform and other clients at risk, is unsupported and must be updated. Tickets regarding end of life software issues will not be entertained and should be directed at the software vendor / developer.
16.5.3. Software with known vulnerabilities may put the platform and other clients at risk, is unsupported and must be updated. Tickets regarding vulnerable software issues will not be entertained and should be directed at the software vendor / developer.

17. Special Terms and Conditions – Email Services (Email Hosting / Website Hositng):

17.1. The following provisional email limits are in place:

17.1.1. Mail sending limits: 100 unique recipients p/user p/hr, 200 p/hr per domain, 200 p/day per user.
17.1.2. Mail size limit: 40 Mbyte.
17.1.3. Mail recipient limit: 20 recipients per message.
17.1.4. Bounce rate: 25% (minimum 5 samples).

*** These limits may be adjusted on a per account, domain or user basis if sufficient motivation is received to warrant this and sufficient resources are available to accomodate these increases. Limit increases are not guaranteed and may be revoked at any time without notice.

17.2. To maintain quick system response times and cut down on system clutter the following email removal policies are in place:

17.2.1. Top-level “Trash” folders are purged of all mail older than 30 days
17.2.2. Top-level “spambox” folders are purged of all mail older than 7 days

18. Special Terms and Conditions – Virtual Private Servers (VPS) and Cloud Servers:

18.1. To maintain the integrity of AllWorldIT services, any virtualized service utilizing excessive amounts of system resources may be throttled or temporarily disabled.

18.2. When necessary, clients/resellers may be required to upgrade the service package to accommodate actual usage. Additionally, to reduce the load on servers, AllWorldIT may relocate virtual systems to different nodes and/or IP addresses.

18.3. Technical Specifications

18.3.1. vCPU – A virtual CPU is defined as a virtualized processor with 1Ghz minimum processing capacity.
18.3.2. Dedicated vCPU – A dedicated virtual CPU is defined as a vCPU that is dedicated to a single client. Processing capacity will not be contended nor shared with other clients.
18.3.3. Underlying CPU’s used are either Xeon or Opteron. Desktop CPU’s are not used.

18.4. Management options

18.4.1. Manage My Server For Me – This option provides 2 hours of administration work per month.
18.4.1.1. Support is provided in terms of section 12 above.
18.4.1.2. Additional hours are billed at $65 p/hr.

19. Special Terms and Conditions – Offsite Backup Service:

19.1. AllWorldIT may relocate any backup service to a different server and/or IP address in an effort to improve service quality and reduce the load on the current platform.

19.2. Download/FTP sites, web-serving (httpd), and/or any usage that results in heavy upstream/outgoing bandwidth consumption (beyond that of normal backup operations) is not permitted. This service is meant for the backup/restore/sharing/storing of data and not for usage normally performed by web/database servers.

20. Special Terms and Conditions – Hosting Account Transfer Service:

20.1. Some packages may include FREE website transfer. This service is designed to assist new clients with the migration of their websites from their current hosting provider to their new hosting account. While we provide this service free of charge we cannot guarantee successful transfer of websites.

20.2. This service is provided on a best effort basis and under the assumption that suffcient means exist to easily acquire all website content and setup information in a format which is supported by the new hosting account’s import/restore facility.

20.3. Website transfer is only supported for accounts hosted on cPanel-based hosting platforms and is subject to the following being provided:

20.3.1. Access to clients current WHM interface and access to all client accounts that require transferring
20.3.2. Backup wizard being accessible under cPanel.
20.3.3. Access to backups via 1) SCP/SFTP; or 2) SSH access.

20.4. NOTE: For all transfers client/reseller is responsible for handling changes with their registrar and ensuring minimal impact due to DNS propogation. If the domain(s) fall under an AllWorldIT reseller registrar account, we can assist in making these changes for you.

20.5. Website transfer requests are processed on a first come first serve basis. The delay for queue processing is generally 10-20 hours.

Version: 201602162332

CHANGES:

2016-02-16

Clarified email limit on unique recipients per user.
Clarified that email limit increases are not guaranteed and depend on available system resources.

2016-02-08

Clarified disaster recovery backups in point 14.3.

2014-08-02

Clarified VPS vCPU text to be more clear.
Added VPS management option text.

2014-06-02

Clarified late payment fee and service termination.

2014-05-14

Included “Offsite” in section 14 as this refers to an additional service provided.
Re-ordered points to be more consistent.
Listed each service with its own special terms and conditions.
Added “Website Hosting” to conditions of “Email Hosting”, as email terms and conditions apply to website hosting too.
Added information on uptime guarantee.
Clarified vCPU’s in VPS section.
Change Virtual Private Server to virtual system and included cloud servers.
Clarified point 7.6 to better portray clients are responsible for ensuring they run the latest stable and secure software
Clarified point 9 that it includes virtual systems
Re-worked section 3
Section 4.1.1 wording changed from “sufficient” to “explicit”
100TB service removed
Added links to each section

2014-05-02

Clarified website transfers are not instant! The queue is generally up to 20hr long.

2014-02-27

Clarified number of MySQL connections permitted.

2013-11-21

Clarified outdated software and update procedure in #11.4 utilized over the past 10 years.

2013-11-10

Clarified section #8.7.3 & #8.7.4 with correct error codes

2013-07-27

Added point numbering
Added explicit mention of resource prioritization #8.8
Added explicit mention of email removal policies #12