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I received an abuse notice. What should I do?

Steps, deadlines, repeated abuses.

Whether you’re hosting at Cherry Servers (and we hope you do) or somewhere else, there’s a chance that sooner or later you’ll receive an abuse notice. We have classified several abuse types:

Spamming is the use of messaging systems to send an unsolicited message (spam), especially advertising, as well as sending messages repeatedly on the same site.

Copyright & Trademark infringement involves using material, such as a copyright or trademark, without the permission of the owner. These acts can include the unauthorized reproduction, distribution, preparation of derivative works, public performance, or display of that material. The infringement does not need to be for monetary gain to be problematic, just without permission.

Malicious activity is any software or manual actions, intentionally designed to cause damage to a computer, server, client, or computer network.

Illegal content, generally speaking, would be the following:

• Child pornography or child abuse;

• Content that shows extreme sexual violence or materials that are overly violent;

• Materials that provoke the viewer into committing crimes and carrying out violent acts. This might be material that instructs, promotes or incites violent acts;

• Content that promotes terrorism or encourages terrorist acts.

In cases of spamming we recommend immediately checking the server for any file modifications, script uploads, unknown running scripts. The reason may also be a hacked user’s website, that’s now acting as a spam sending agent. In such cases Exim’s email queue should show an increase e-mail pollution. Last, but not least, a scan for rootkits may also help identify the culprits. One may also choose to use third-party software that specializes in spam detection. Spamming incidents, more usually than not, result in an immediate SMTP port block. Repeated incidents result in a permanent SMTP block.

Upon receiving a copyright & trademark infringement notice you should immediately check if you or your client(s) may be hosting any type of media material, that requires separate licensing rights, which you or your client(s) may not have. We at Cherry Servers most usually provide specific links to the infringing material, so that should help in the identification process. In cases of copyright and trademark infringements we reserve the right to block internet access to associated internet links and for repeated incidents we reserve the right to block the server’s HTTP/HTTPS access completely. Each non-repeating incident is given 24 hours to be addressed.

Malicious activity abuse reports are first forwarded to an associated client, whom is then given 24 hours to identify the problem and take action. As with spamming, firstly we recommend scanning the operating system with anti-virus and anti-malware software (if available for a given operating system) and remove any found threat ASAP. Ignoring the incident will result in a particular IP address getting blocked and repeated incidents may results in a permanent IP address block.

Illegal content, in most cases, will result in an immediate URL link and HTTP/HTTPS port block until all related material is permanently removed from our network. Repeated incidents may result in a permanent service suspension.

Please inform us at abuse@cherryservers.com as soon as you’ve addressed any of the above mentioned incidents and you believe the problem is solved. This can be done by replying to the created abuse ticket.