Acceptance of Use Policy

By submitting an online order form, or by using CompitentHosting’s service, Customer hereby agrees to the following Acceptable Use Policy (AUP). Customer agrees that it shall comply with and require its end users to comply with this AUP, CompitentHosting’s Terms of Service (TOS), CompitentHosting’s No-Spam Policy (NSP), and CompitentHosting’s Privacy Policy. In this document, the word “Agreement,” with a capital “A,” refers to the TOS, the AUP, the NSP, and the Privacy Policy collectively.

1. Introduction, Purpose, and General Terms.

1.1. This website gives you the ability to learn about CompitentHostingnd its products and services as well as the ability to access our services. By using this site, and any other sites or services owned, operated, or provided by CompitentHosting, you signify your agreement to the terms, conditions and notices of this policy. “You” when used in the Agreement shall mean the CompitentHosting Customer of record and that CompitentHosting Customer’s end users.
1.2. This Acceptable Use Policy is used in conjunction with the terms of service (TOS), the No-Spam Policy (NSP), and the Privacy Policy. Violating any of these policies and agreements grants CompitentHosting the authority to take action to restrict or terminate your access to CompitentHosting Services. CompitentHosting reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to update or revise this policy, any other policy or statement on any CompitentHosting website, and any product offerings or programs described on any CompitentHosting website. Please check back periodically to review any changes to this policy.
1.3. This document sets forth the principles, guidelines and requirements of the Acceptable Use Policy of CompitentHosting (“Company”) governing the use by the Customer (“Customer”) of the Company’s services and products (“Services and Products”). The purpose of CompitentHosting’s Acceptable Use Policy (the AUP”) is to comply with all international, federal, state, and local laws and to protect the network security, network availability, physical security, Customer privacy, and other factors affecting the services provided by CompitentHosting. CompitentHosting reserves the right to impose reasonable rules and regulations regarding the use of its services provided to all Customers.
1.4. In order to maintain an informative and valuable service that meets the needs of the users of this site and CompitentHosting Services, the rules in this AUP have been established to protect against abuse. The AUP is not an all-inclusive, exhaustive list and CompitentHosting reserves the right to revise, amend, or modify the AUP at any time as needed, effective upon either the posting of the revised, amended, or modified AUP to http://www.compitenthosting.com/acceptance-of-use-policy/ or notification to the Customer via e-mail to the e-mail address of Customer as set forth in the Service Descriptions.
1.5. Any violation of the AUP may result in the suspension or termination of your account or such other action, as CompitentHosting deems appropriate. No credits will be issued for any interruption in service resulting from violations of the AUP.
1.6. VIOLATION OF ANY SECTION OF THE AUP IS STRICTLY PROHIBITED AND MAY RESULT IN THE IMMEDIATE TERMINATION OR SUSPENSION OF THE SERVICES YOU RECEIVE FROM COMPITENTHOSTING.
1.7. Any questions or comments regarding the AUP should be directed to CompitentHosting by ticket using the Customer Portal (https://www.compitenthosting.com/central/) for issues concerning the AUP.

2. General Prohibitions.

You may not use this site or CompitentHosting’s Services for any purpose that is unlawful or in any manner that could damage, disable, overburden or impair the operation of this site, the CompitentHosting Network, or CompitentHosting’s Services, or any other party’s use or enjoyment of this site, the CompitentHosting Network, or CompitentHosting’s Services.

3. Compliance with Law.

Customer shall not use CompitentHosting’s Service or any other service or network to post, upload, transmit, retransmit, store, distribute or facilitate the distribution of any content, including without limitation text, communications, software, images, sounds, data, or other information that, in CompitentHosting’s sole discretion:
3.1. violates, attempts to violate, or helps any third party to violate any local, state, federal, international, or non-American law, ordinance, or regulation,
3.2. is threatening, obscene, indecent, pornographic, abusive, harassing, libelous, defamatory, deceptive, fraudulent, invasive of another’s privacy, tortious, inaccurate, or that otherwise could adversely affect any individual, group or entity (collectively, “Persons”),
3.3. threatens or encourages bodily harm or destruction of property,
3.4. harms any person,
3.5. victimizes, harasses, degrades, or intimidates an individual or group of individuals on the basis of religion, sex, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, national origin, immigration status, age, disability, or any other reason,
3.6. is posted in violation of a newsgroup charter,
3.7. contains viruses, corrupted files, or any other similar software or programs that may damage the operation of another’s computer,
3.8. violates any terms or conditions of any other network access provider or Internet service provider,
3.9. violates the rights of any person, including rights protected by copyright, trade secret, patent or other intellectual property or similar laws or regulations including, but not limited to, the installation or distribution of “pirated” information content or data or other software products that are not appropriately licensed for use by Customer. Customer shall be responsible for determining what laws or regulations are applicable to its use of the Services and Products,
3.10. adds, removes, or modifies identifying network header information in an effort to deceive or mislead any person. Additionally, attempting to impersonate any person by using forged headers or other identifying information is prohibited. However, the use of anonymous remailers or nicknames does not by itself constitute impersonation, unless such use is made with the intent to deceive, defraud, or mislead any person or to violate any applicable laws or regulations,
3.11. collects, attempts to collect, or helps any third party to collect personal information about third parties without their knowledge or consent or in a manner that violates applicable laws concerning privacy, or
3.12. has a negative effect on CompitentHosting or its network (including, without limitation, overloading servers on the CompitentHosting Network; causing portions of the CompitentHosting Network to be blocked by other network providers; generating unresolved third party complaints or complaints which, in the discretion of CompitentHosting, impose an unreasonable administrative burden on CompitentHosting; etc).

4. System and Network Security.

Violations of system or network security are strictly prohibited, and may result in criminal and civil liability as well as termination of services from CompitentHosting. CompitentHosting investigates all incidents involving such violations and will cooperate with law enforcement if a violation of the criminal law is suspected.

You are responsible for any misuse of your account, even if a friend, family member, guest, agent, or employee committed the inappropriate activity while using your account. 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 the security of another CompitentHosting account or attempt to gain unauthorized access to another network or server.

Examples of system or network security violations include, without limitation, the following:

4.1. Introduction into the network or server of any malicious program (examples: viruses, worms, Trojan Horses, logic bombs, and other executables intended to inflict harm).
4.2. Introduction into the network or server of any self-extracting file or program containing any malicious program as specified in Section 4.1 of this AUP.
4.3. Introduction into the network or server of any data, parameter, configuration, template, or control files for software applications that contain destructive macros or other malicious code.
4.4. Introduction into the network or server of any encrypted or compressed file or archive such as .zip or .gz files that contains any malicious program as specified in paragraphs 4.1 through 4.3 of this AUP.
4.5. Effecting security breaches or disruptions of Internet communication and/or connectivity. Security breaches include, but are not limited to, accessing data of which the Customer is not an intended recipient, logging into a server or account that the Customer is not expressly authorized to access, or exceeding the access to a server or account that has been granted to the Customer. For purposes of this section, “disruption” includes, but is not limited to port scans, flood pings, email-bombing, packet spoofing, IP spoofing, and forged routing information.
4.6. Executing any form of network activity that will intercept data not intended for the Customer.
4.7. Circumventing user authentication or security of any host, network or account.
4.8. Interfering with or denying service to any user other than users of the Customer’s host (examples: denial of service attack or distributed denial of service attack).
4.9. Using any program script/command, or sending messages of any kind such as a punter, designed to interfere with or to disable, a user’s terminal session, via any means, locally or via the Internet.
4.10. Attempting to use or gain unauthorized access to data, accounts, hosts, servers, systems or networks of this site, or to probe, scan or test the vulnerability of a system or network of this site, any CompitentHosting Services or those of any other party.
4.11. Interfering with service to any user, host or network including, without limitation, mail-bombing, flooding, or attempting to overload the system.
4.12. Forging any TCP-IP packet header or any part of the header information in an e-mail or a newsgroup posting.
4.13 Falsifying address information or otherwise modifying e-mail headers to conceal the sender’s or the recipient’s identity.

5. Internet Etiquette.

The Customer agrees to observe and abide by reasonable Internet etiquette (Netiquette). The Customer shall comply with the rules appropriate to any network to which CompitentHosting may provide access. The Customer should not post, transmit, or permit Internet access to information the Customer desires to keep confidential. The Customer shall not post any material that is illegal, is libelous, is otherwise tortious, indecently depicts children, or is likely to result in retaliation against CompitentHosting by offended users. CompitentHosting reserves the right to refuse or terminate service at any time for violation of this section. This includes, but is not limited to, advertising services or sites via Internet Relay Chat (IRC) or USENET in clear violation of the policies of the IRC channel or USENET group.

6. Child Pornography.

CompitentHosting will cooperate fully with any criminal investigation into a Customer’s violation of the Child Protection Act of 1984 concerning child pornography, or any other applicable international, federal, state, or local law that prohibits child pornography. Customers are ultimately responsible for the actions of their clients over CompitentHosting network, and shall be liable for illegal material posted by their clients.
According to the Child Protection Act, child pornography includes photographs, films, video, or any other type of visual presentation that shows a person who is or is depicted as being under the age of eighteen years and is engaged in or is depicted as engaged in explicit sexual activity, or the dominant characteristic of which is the depiction, for a sexual purpose, of a sexual organ or the anal region of a person under the age of eighteen years or any written material or visual representation that advocates or counsels sexual activity with a person under the age of eighteen years.
Violations of the Child Protection Act may be reported to the Texas Police and/or the United States Federal Police

7. No Editing, Censoring, or Control of Communications; Reservation of Rights.

Your participation in online communication or use of any CompitentHosting service is not edited, censored, or otherwise controlled by CompitentHosting. However, CompitentHosting reserves the right to monitor content on this site and on any CompitentHosting servers, networks, or systems and to remove content, disable sites, or suspend or terminate services if CompitentHosting, in its sole discretion, determines such content or user practices are harmful, offensive, or otherwise in violation of this Acceptable Use Policy.

8. International Use.

CompitentHosting makes no representation that materials available on this site or any or through any CompitentHosting service are appropriate or available for use in locations outside the United States, and accessing them or using them from territories where their contents are illegal is prohibited. Customers and their users who access this site or any site hosted by CompitentHosting from locations outside the United States are solely responsible for compliance with all applicable local laws and regulations. Moreover, to the extent allowed by law, Customers agree to defend, indemnify, and hold harmless CompitentHosting, its divisions, subsidiaries, partners, joint venturers, employees and agents, and all their respective heirs, successors, and assigns for any acts of Customer or Customer’s users that may violate any applicable law.

9. Intellectual Property Rights.

9.1. All CompitentHosting website design, text, graphics and the selection and arrangement thereof are the copyrighted work of CompitentHosting. All rights reserved. If any page, information, or content is copied, it may only be copied for non-commercial uses that are explicitly allowed under the Customer’s Agreement with CompitentHosting or by law, and CompitentHosting shall, in any event, retain all copyright and other proprietary interests in said page, information, or content.
9.2. You acknowledge and agree that copyrights, trademarks, service marks, patents, trade secrets, and other proprietary rights and laws protect all content and materials available on this site or through any CompitentHosting service. Nothing on any CompitentHosting website shall be interpreted or implied in such a way as conferring any license or right to any intellectual property rights or license to any intellectual property, content, technology, system, process, or related material belonging to CompitentHosting by virtue of it being displayed or made accessible on any CompitentHosting website. Except as expressly authorized, you agree not to use this site or any CompitentHosting Services in any manner that would infringe, violate, dilute or misappropriate any such rights, with respect to any material, which you may access, receive or make available through this site or any CompitentHosting Services.
9.3. If you use a domain name or content in connection with the CompitentHosting web hosting, or any other web hosting service, you agree not to use that domain name or content in any way which violates any trademark, service mark, or similar rights of any third party. Specifically, and without limitation, you agree that you will not engage in, attempt to engage in, or conspire with others or solicit others to engage in any cybersquatting or domain name hijacking,
9.4 CompitentHosting’s data center infrastructure including all hardware, software, and telecommunications facilities located in its data center may only be used for lawful purposes. Transmission, distribution, or storage of any information, data or material in violation of any United States or U.S. state regulation or law or the common law, or any applicable foreign or international law is prohibited. This includes, but is not limited to, material protected by copyright, trademark, patent, trade secret, or other intellectual property rights.
9.5. Creating, utilising, or distributing unauthorised copies of software or other information content is a violation of international, federal, and state law. If you copy, distribute, or install software or other information content in ways that the license to use that content does not allow, you are violating federal copyright law and international copyright law. CompitentHosting will cooperate with all law enforcement agencies in relation to alleged copyright infringement based on content housed anywhere on our our network.

10. Customer’s Grant of Limited License to CompitentHosting; Warranties on Content.

By posting or submitting content to any CompitentHosting website or server, you:
10.1. Grant CompitentHosting a limited license to transmit, copy, store, back up, and retrieve the content, solely for the purpose of providing you with the services you are purchasing under your Agreement with CompitentHosting;
10.2. Acknowledge that you are placing data on servers, networks, and systems that reside physically in the United States. Such servers, networks, and systems are governed by United States law and not by the laws of other jurisdiction. As such, your rights to privacy are governed by United States law and the CompitentHosting privacy policy. By ordering or using CompitentHosting’s services, you explicitly consent to this provision regarding privacy.

WHILE COMPITENTHOSTING WILL MAKE REASONABLE EFFORTS TO PROTECT THE PRIVACY OF YOUR INFORMATION AND TO COMPLY WITH NATIONAL PRIVACY LAWS AND BEST PRACTICE PRINCIPALS, PLEASE BE ADVISED THAT YOUR PRIVACY RIGHTS AVAILABLE UNDER UNITED STATES LAW AND THE COMPITENTHOSTING PRIVACY POLICY MAY BE GREATER THAN OR LESS THAN THOSE GUARANTEED BY THE LAWS OF THE COUNTRY WHERE YOU RESIDE.
10.3. Warrant and represent that you own or otherwise control all of the rights to the content and that public posting and use of your content by CompitentHosting does not and will not infringe or violate the rights of any third party; and
10.4. Agree to defend, hold harmless, and indemnify CompitentHosting for any claims of any third party resulting from the public posting or use of your content.

11. IP Allocation.

CompitentHosting administers an Internet network on which multiple Customer servers reside. Customers shall NOT use Internet protocol (IP) addresses that were not assigned to them by CompitentHosting staff or network administrators.

12. Restrictions on Use of CompitentHosting Services.

The customer agrees to make use of CompitentHosting Web Hosting servers primarily for the purpose of hosting a website. The follow restrictions apply:

12.1 Adult content is not permitted.
12.2 Hacker related sites are not permitted.
12.3 Hate sites are not permitted.
12.4 Free web hosting companies are not permitted.
12.5 Demo accounts are not permitted.
12.6 Proxy Scripts / Anonymizers are not permitted.
12.7 HYIP (High Yield Investment Programs), FOREX, egold exchange and related sites are not permitted.
12.8 Lottery and Gambling sites are not permitted.
12.9 Autosurfing sites / Ad servers are not permitted.
12.10 Any site taking part in an illegal action are not permitted.
12.11 Operating a public mirror site is not permitted.
12.12 Offering Image, File, Video, Document, Data Storage and Email Services are strictly prohibited.
12.13 You may not use CompitentHosting servers as a storage system (local computer backups, backups, archives, file storage, image storage, video storage, etc.) only website files are permitted. Unpermitted storage will automatically be removed.
12.14 Bruteforce Programs are not permitted.
12.15 Mail Bombers and Spam Scripts are not permitted.
12.16 CompitentHosting servers should not be used as an SSH bounce point to other servers and networks.
12.17 Torrent related websites are not permitted.
12.18 You may send a maximum of 500 emails per hour.
12.19 A cron job should not execute more frequently than once every 5 minutes
12.20 You may not run any chat script or shoutbox due to their extreme cpu and mysql usage.
12.21 You may not store copyrighted files, images, videos, etc. without authorization from the copyright owner.
12.22 You may not create multiple full backups at once on CompitentHosting servers. You must wait for one to complete before starting the next.
12.23 You may not create core dumps.
12.24 You may not run scripts or services that will use an excessive amount of server resources or cause issues on the server.
12.25 You may not run programs that run in the background or listen on a network port.
12.26 Remote mysql usage may only be used for remote database editing.
12.27 CompitentHosting reserves the right to add further restrictions to Customers’use of the CompitentHosting Services if such further restrictions are reasonably necessary to keep its hosting service operating efficiently for all users.

CompitentHosting reserves the right to suspend accounts if any of the above restrictions are violated.

13. Suspension and Cancellation.

CompitentHosting reserves the right to suspend service to any Customer or who is using our network or services for violation of the AUP, the NSP, the Privacy Policy, or the TOS. CompitentHosting will use reasonable care in notifying the Customer and in resolving the problem in a method resulting in the least amount of service interference as reasonably possible. CompitentHosting reserves the right to terminate service without notice for continued and repeated violations of the AUP, the NSP, the Privacy Policy, or the TOS.
If your site is suspended for not making your hosting payment even within the grace period there will be a $10 service charge in addition to any late payment fee  to reactivate your account. Unpaid Invoices after 3 days will result in deletion of the account without prior intimation at the sole discretion of CompitentHosting.
13.1 Resource usage.
You agree to not use an excessive amount of server resources. Any violations may result in CompitentHosting taking corrective action in order maintain server stability by killing any processes, disabling and/or suspending your account.

14. Notices Regarding Violations of AUP and Intellectual Property Rights.

14.1. The CompitentHosting Agreement and all its components prohibit acts of copyright and trademark infringement and other unlawful behavior by CompitentHosting Customers. CompitentHosting takes Customer violations seriously and will investigate complaints and, where appropriate, may remove content, disable sites, suspend or terminate services, or take other action as necessary.
14.2. General Complaints: Please send reports of any activity in violation of this Acceptable Use Policy to none If possible, please provide the IP address used to commit the violation, the date and time of the violation, and evidence of the violation. CompitentHosting will reasonably investigate incidents involving such alleged violations. CompitentHosting may involve and will cooperate with law enforcement officials if any criminal activity is suspected. Violations may result in criminal and civil liability.
14.3. Copyright/Trademark Infringement Complaints: If you believe that your copyright or trademark has been used by a CompitentHosting subscriber without permission, such that the use may constitute infringement of your intellectual property rights, please contact us via the Customer Portal (https://www.compitenthosting.com/central/)

15. Miscellaneous.

All monetary amounts to which this Agreement refers shall be in American dollars and shall include the Goods and Services Tax (GST).

CompitentHosting reserves the right to refuse service to anyone. Any material that, in our judgment, is obscene or threatening is prohibited and will be removed from our servers with or without notice.

Failure to respond to email from our abuse department within 48 hours may result in the suspension or termination of your services. All abuse issues must be dealt with via troubleticket/email and will have a response within 48 hours.

If in doubt regarding the acceptability of your site or service, please contact us via the Customer Portal (https://www.compitenthosting.com/central/) and we will be happy to assist you.