Acceptable Use Policy — Managed VPS

1. Permitted Uses

The Service is provided for lawful business and personal purposes. Permitted workloads include:

• Web hosting, e-commerce, and web application hosting
• Database hosting and management
• Development, staging, and testing environments
• Email server hosting (subject to anti-spam obligations in Section 4)
• File storage and backup services for your own use
• VPN services for your own organisation's secure remote access (not for resale as a public VPN service without prior written consent)
• Game server hosting for personal or commercial use
• Media streaming for your own content
• Business application hosting including CRM, ERP, and collaboration tools
• Legitimate security research on systems you own or have explicit written authorisation to test

2. Absolute Prohibitions

The following activities are absolutely prohibited regardless of intent, claimed purpose, or jurisdiction. They will result in immediate account termination without refund and mandatory reporting to the relevant law enforcement authorities:

• Hosting, distributing, transmitting, or facilitating access to child sexual abuse material (CSAM) or any content that sexually exploits or endangers minors — this will be reported to the National Crime Agency (NCA) and the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) immediately and without warning
• Planning, facilitating, funding, or executing terrorist acts or acts of political violence against any government, organisation, or individual
• Creating, distributing, or deploying malware, ransomware, spyware, trojans, keyloggers, rootkits, or any software designed to cause harm, gain unauthorised access, or facilitate criminal activity
• Using the Service to conduct or facilitate human trafficking, slavery, or exploitation of any kind

3. General Prohibited Activities

The following activities are prohibited and will result in suspension or termination of the Service:

• Conducting or facilitating denial-of-service (DoS or DDoS) attacks against any target, whether individual, corporate, or government
• Performing unauthorised port scanning, network probing, vulnerability scanning, or reconnaissance against systems you do not own or have explicit written authorisation to test
• Gaining or attempting to gain unauthorised access to any computer system, network, database, or device
• Phishing, spear-phishing, or any other form of social engineering against third parties
• Identity theft, fraud, or financial crime of any kind
• Hosting phishing websites, fraudulent pages, or content designed to impersonate other organisations or individuals
• Distributing or hosting content that incites violence, terrorism, racial hatred, or discrimination contrary to UK law
• Storing or transmitting stolen personal data, credit card data, or any data obtained through unlawful means
• Operating Tor exit nodes, I2P exit nodes, or open proxies without our prior written consent
• Hosting content that infringes the intellectual property rights of third parties, including copyright-infringing material
• Running botnets, click fraud, or any automated abuse of third-party services
• Harassing, stalking, threatening, or intimidating any individual or group
• Circumventing, tampering with, or disabling our monitoring agents, security tools, or backup systems
• Using the Service to violate any applicable sanction regimes, export control laws, or embargoes
• Reselling access to the Managed VPS or its resources to third parties without our prior written authorisation

4. Email and Anti-Spam

Where you operate an email server on your Managed VPS, you must:

• Not use your server as an open mail relay under any circumstances
• Not send unsolicited bulk email (spam) or facilitate others in doing so
• Only send marketing emails to recipients who have explicitly opted in and maintain proper suppression lists
• Correctly configure SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records for all domains sending email from your server
• Promptly investigate and resolve any abuse complaints received at abuse@ or postmaster@ addresses for your domains
• Notify us immediately at [email protected] if your server is compromised and used to send spam without your knowledge
• Monitor your outbound mail queues and immediately suspend sending if you detect unusual volumes

We reserve the right to block outbound email from your server temporarily if we receive credible abuse reports or detect spam activity, and will notify you immediately when doing so.

5. Resource Usage

Unlike shared hosting, your Managed VPS resources (CPU, RAM, bandwidth, and storage) are dedicated to you. You may use your allocated resources without restriction for permitted workloads. However:

• Cryptocurrency mining is not permitted without our prior written consent, as it generates sustained maximum CPU load that may impact our wider infrastructure
• Where your usage consistently exceeds your allocated plan resources, we will contact you to discuss an upgrade; we will not throttle your service without first attempting to contact you
• Activities that generate excessive network traffic affecting other customers or our infrastructure may be subject to temporary rate limiting; we will notify you before imposing ongoing restrictions
• You must not use your server to amplify network traffic (e.g. DNS amplification, NTP amplification) regardless of whether it is intentional

6. Content Standards

While we do not actively monitor content hosted on your Managed VPS, content that is accessible via the public internet and hosted on your server must comply with UK law and must not include:

• Content that is illegal under the Online Safety Act 2023 or any other applicable UK legislation
• Content that constitutes harassment, cyberstalking, or targeted abuse of any individual
• Content that promotes self-harm or suicide in a manner likely to encourage such behaviour
• Deepfake or synthetic intimate imagery created without the subject's consent
• Content that glorifies or promotes serious violence

We will respond to valid legal notices and takedown requests relating to content hosted on your server. Where we receive a valid court order or law enforcement request, we will comply and notify you where we are permitted to do so.

7. DMCA and Copyright Takedown

We respond to valid copyright infringement notices submitted under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) and equivalent UK legislation. If you believe content hosted on a server we manage infringes your copyright, submit a notice to [email protected] including:

• Identification of the copyrighted work you claim has been infringed
• Identification of the infringing material and its URL or location
• Your contact information including name, address, telephone number, and email
• A statement that you have a good faith belief that the use is not authorised
• A statement that the information in your notice is accurate and, under penalty of perjury, that you are authorised to act on behalf of the copyright owner

Upon receipt of a valid notice we will investigate and take appropriate action, which may include notifying the account holder and, where appropriate, removing or disabling access to the infringing content.

8. Security Responsibilities

You are responsible for the security of software and applications you install on your Managed VPS. You must:

• Keep all software you install up to date with security patches
• Use strong, unique passwords and SSH keys for all access credentials
• Not disable or interfere with our monitoring agents or security tools
• Immediately notify us at [email protected] if you discover or suspect a security breach or compromise of your server
• Not use your server for offensive security activities against third-party systems without explicit written authorisation from the target system owner

Where your server is compromised and used to conduct malicious activity against third parties, we reserve the right to isolate it from the network immediately and without prior notice. We will notify you as soon as practicable and work with you to remediate the issue.

9. Monitoring and Enforcement

We do not actively monitor the content of your server as a matter of course. However, we may monitor aggregate network behaviour, bandwidth usage, and traffic patterns to detect potential AUP violations. Where we receive a credible abuse report from a third party or identify potential prohibited activity through our monitoring systems, we may:

• Contact you to investigate and request information about your use of the Service
• Temporarily suspend network access to your server pending investigation
• Permanently terminate your account if a violation is confirmed
• Report the matter to law enforcement or regulatory authorities
• Seek compensation for damages caused to our infrastructure, reputation, or third parties

We will make reasonable efforts to contact you before taking action except where immediate action is required to protect our infrastructure or third parties.

10. Abuse Reporting

If you believe our Managed VPS infrastructure is being used in violation of this AUP, please report it to [email protected]. Please include as much detail as possible, including relevant IP addresses, timestamps, log extracts, and any other supporting evidence. We take all abuse reports seriously and will investigate all credible reports promptly.

11. Changes to This AUP

We may update this AUP at any time with at least 14 days' prior written notice. Continued use of the Service after the effective date of any update constitutes acceptance of the revised AUP.

12. Contact

Layer 9 Solutions Ltd
Company No. 14857666
124 City Road, London, England, EC1V 2NX
Abuse: [email protected]
Security: [email protected]
Legal: [email protected]