John Morton, head of Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE), stated at a press conference late last year, that he wants netheads to know something about his agency: they are "not the police of the Internet"

So when the Department of Justice and Homeland Security’s ICE office proudly announced that they had seized domains related to counterfeit goods and child pornography, they failed to mention that one of the targeted domains belongs to a free DNS provider.

This past weekend, 84,000 websites were wrongfully accused of links to child pornography crimes leaving many website owners scratching their heads (and seething red) that a banner replaced their website domain reading.

“Advertisement, distribution, transportation, receipt, and possession of child pornography constitute federal crimes that carry penalties for first time offenders of up to 30 years in federal prison, a $250,000 fine, forfeiture and restitution,”

As with previous seizures, ICE convinced a District Court judge to sign a seizure warrant, and then contacted the domain registries to point the domains in question to a server that hosts the warning message. However, somewhere in this process a mistake was made and as a result the domain of a large DNS service provider was seized.

John Morton's little speech also included the line “I am here to emphasize that good law enforcement now requires investigation on and through the web. It’s enforcement that protects the internet from crime and exploitation; it’s enforcement that should receive strong public support.

Eighty Four thousand website netheads likely agree that the web needs protection from the meatheads “investigating” at the ICE.

Read the speech (ice.gov)

Other coverage on this story can be found

FreeDNS 

Torrent Freak 

ars technica

Where you will not find coverage of this story

ICE news 

Main stream “media” outlets

Senator: domain name seizures "alarmingly unprecedented"

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) has 10 tough questions for the department of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), all of which can be more easily summed up in a single, blunter question: what the hell are you guys doing over there?

Wyden's displeasure is over ICE's Operation In Our Sites, the controversial program that began seizing Internet domain names last year, and just grabbed several more sports-related domains recently. The seizures are all signed off on by a federal judge, but the affected parties get no warning and no chance to first challenge the claim that they are running illegal businesses. ICE grabbed the domain Rojadirecta.org, a site that links to live sports on the Web and has twice been declared legal by Spanish courts.

In a letter to ICE director John Morton. Wyden asks whether merely linking to infringing online content is illegal (several of the seized domain names did not host any infringing content themselves). He wants to know why the domain names are being seized, but why there's no attempt to prosecute those behind the sites, if these are really criminals. And he wants ICE to keep (and make public) a list of the companies that have lobbied for any particular site's name to be seized, all to ensure that “Operation In Our Sites is not used to create competitive advantages in the marketplace.”

Wyden also digs into one specific case, last year's seizure of the dajaz1.com domain name. The site, which blogged about music and hosted some downloads, was claimed to infringe on copyrights, but Wyden notes that press reports later showed that many of the songs on the site had been provided to its operator directly by music industry executives. Despite the stories, ICE made no apparent move to look into the case or restore the site's original domain name. Wyden wants "the Administration's justification for continued seizure of this domain name and its rationale for not providing this domain name operator, and others, due process.”

Ten Questions  for John Morton

1. How does ICE and DoJ measure the effectiveness of Operation In our Sites and domain seizures more broadly -- how does the government measure the benefits and costs of seizing domain names?

2. Of the nearly 100 domain names seized by the Obama Administration over the last 9 months, how many prosecutions were initiated, how many indictments obtained, and how were the operators of these domain names provided due process?

3. What is the process for selecting a domain name for seizure and, specifically, what criteria are used?
          1. Does the Administration make any distinction between domain names that are operated overseas and those that are operated in the U.S.?
          2. Does the Administration consider whether a domain name operated overseas is in compliance with the domestic law from which the domain name is operated?
          3. What standard does the Administration use to ensure that domains are not seized that also facilitate legitimate speech?
          4. What standards does ICE use to ensure that it does not seize the domain names of websites the legal status of which could be subject to legitimate debate in a U.S. court of law; how does ICE ensure that seizures target on the true "bad actors?"

4. Does the Administration believe that hyperlinks to domain names that offer downloadable infringing content represent a distribution of infringing content, or do they represent speech?

5. Does the Administration believe that websites that facilitate discussion about where to find infringing content on the Internet represents speech or the distribution of infringed content? What if the discussion on these websites includes hyperlinks to websites that offer downloadable, infringing content?

6. What standard does DoJ expect foreign countries to use when determining whether to seize a domain name controlled in the U.S. for copyright infringement?

7. Did DoJ and ICE take into account the legality of Rojadirecta.org before it seized its domain name? If so, did DoJ and ICE consult with the Department of State or the United States Trade Representative before seizing this site in order to consider how doing so is consistent with U.S. foreign policy and commercial objectives?

8. In an affidavit written by Special Agent Andrew Reynolds, he uses his ability to download four specific songs on the domain name dajaz1.com as justification for seizure of this domain name. According to press accounts, the songs in question were legally provided to the operator of the domain name for the purpose of distribution. Please explain the Administration's justification for continued seizure of this domain name and its rationale for not providing this domain name operator, and others, due process.

9. Can you please provide to me a list of all the domain names seized by the Obama Administration since January of 2009 and provide the basis for their seizure?

10. Do ICE and DoJ keep a record of who meets with federal law enforcement about particular domain names? If not, would you consider keeping such a record and making it publicly available, to ensure transparency in government and that Operation in our Sites is not used to create competitive advantages in the marketplace?

Just in case ICE had any doubts about Wyden's hostility to the entire process, the Senator makes his broader position clear:

"In contrast to ordinary copyright litigation, the domain name seizure process does not appear to give targeted websites an opportunity to defend themselves before sanctions are imposed. As you know, there is an active and contentious legal debate about when a website may be held liable for infringing activities by its users. I worry that domain name seizures could function as a means for end-running the normal legal process in order to target websites that may prevail in full court. The new enforcement approach used by Operation In Our Sites is alarmingly unprecedented in the breadth of its potential reach...

For the Administration's efforts to be seen as legitimate, it should be able to defend its use of the forfeiture laws by prosecuting operators of domain names and provide a means to ensure due process. If the federal government is going to take property and risk stifling speech, it must be able to defend those actions not only behind closed doors but also in a court of law."

Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act  

Managed dedicated server provider DedicatedNOW and SolarVPS have announced a merger, stating in their press release “it is designed to expand service coverage to 5 major cities around the world and improve service options”. DedicatedNOW and SolarVPS will merge to form one larger entity while retaining both brands.

“The Hype”

“This merger brings together a unique combination of talents between DedicatedNOW and Solar VPS. Our new company has vast experience with Windows hosting, virtualization, dedicated and managed hosting,” said Ross Brouse, former CEO of SolarVPS, who will now serve as COO of the combined company. “We’ve brought together so many talented individuals whose knowledge we are blending to develop truly unique hosted partner and customer offerings.

Although there is no change in management or existing server locations, the merger will provide benefits to new and existing customers of both companies. DedicatedNOW customers now have access to Windows web hosting support and virtualization. Additionally, with access to SolarVPS’s locations, DedicatedNOW will be offering hosting for new servers in Los Angeles, Dallas and Miami.

(editor geographical note to readers...  Los Angeles, Dallas and Miami and New Jersey, while not small, are not necessarily major, are not around the world, and do not add up to five)

“I’m excited about the new opportunities that will open up as a result of this move. Both DedicatedNOW and SolarVPS customers will have access to more staff, better resources and a wider product selection. The merger makes both brands stronger, more marketable and sets the foundation for the growth of our cloud hosting division,” says Jason Silverglate, CEO.

Financial considerations were not disclosed.

“The Reality”

Ross Brouse and Jason Silverglate have been collaborating for number of years and in 2008 established MessageWire, a company offering a number of services including Hosted Exchange and Software as a Service.

The MessageWire company information page states that “Pegasus began as a shared hosting business and later morphed into the highly successful Dedicated-NOW. Jason owns and operates the FortressITX data center in Clifton, NJ, which is home to both MessageWire and Solar VPS.”

Conclusion

While officially the merger was announced this week, clients of either brand can likely anticipate very little change from what they have been experiencing in the recent past. Reviews of SolarVPS on HostJury do suggest there may have been some past issue, (support is rated zero), a though search suggests their current situation may have improved. DedicatedNOW and SolarVPS clients can review their experiences on HostJury.

For many, the hassles associated with registering a domain is limited to finding a suitable name that has not been registered by some domain squatter hoping to make a few dollars. For others, such as e-commerce and businesses types functioning in a global economy, ensuring that other firms do not profit from your earned goodwill or from a potential clients mistaken identity is no same feat. With over 21 generic domains such as .com, .net., .edu or .org and hundreds of others for countries, the cost of domain registration has become a major capital expenditure. And it is about to get infinitely more expensive!

The Washington Post has a interesting piece on the coming massive expansion to the Internet's domain name system. The mundane and ordinary dot com domain extension is about to face vast new competition that will dramatically transform the Web as we know it. New Web sites, with more subject-specific, sometimes controversial suffixes such as .eco, .love, .god, .sport, .gay or .kurd.

While it has not been decided (at least publicly) who is going to get .amazon - the Internet retailer or Brazil, with a price tag to apply at $185,000, the cost ensures only well heeled organizations will be seriously applying to operate the domains. That's on top of the $25,000 annual fee domain operators have to pay ICANN.

Many organizations are competing for the same domain names extensions, in disputes that often will be settled by an ICANN-sponsored auction or by an ICANN board decision. Two companies vying for the environmentally-friendly .eco domain have competing endorsements: one from a nonprofit chaired by former vice president Al Gore; the other from a group founded by former Soviet Union president Mikhail Gorbachev. And the stakes are high. The successful organization could potentially sell hundreds of thousands of dot eco web addresses for wholesale prices to domain registrars, which would then market the extensions to consumers for higher prices.

While there are mechanisms in place to gain control of a domain once it has been registered by someone else, the procedure is time consuming and has some inherent risk. Many firms chose to mitigate the likelihood by procuring the domains when they are available. Fail safe, but costly! 

This week, hundreds of investors, consultants and entrepreneurs are expected to converge in San Francisco for the first ".nxt" conference, a three-day affair featuring seminars on ICANN's complicated application guidelines.

Time Warner Cable and NaviSite announced that they have entered into an agreement under which Time Warner Cable will acquire NaviSite

The acquisition provides Time Warner an immediate presence in the managed services market with NaviSite’s more than 1,200 customers. Following the completion of the acquisition, Time Warner Cable plans to continue the service of NaviSite’s Enterprise customers and to use NaviSite’s operational expertise and enterprise-class infrastructure to meet the rapidly growing demand for managed services offerings from Time Warner Cable’s existing and future small and medium-sized business customers.

NaviSite employs approximately 570 people worldwide. It operates ten data centers in the United States and the United Kingdom, including two SAS 70 Type II certified data centers, and network operations centers in Gurgaon, India and Andover, Massachusetts.

“Following on from the success of the earlier CrimeMapper site which we developed for all 43 English and Welsh police forces in October 2009, the National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA) asked us to take it further, a lot further. On 1st February the new street level crime mapping and local policing website, covering England and Wales, was launched by Nick Herbert, Minister of State for Policing and Criminal Justice” announced Rock Kitchen Harris, a UK website design and public relations firm in the news section of their website

Rock Kitchen Harris continues “The site provides the most detailed crime information on this scale anywhere in the world. We not only designed, built and manage the site we also arranged the hosting using a mix of servers, with the public website using scaleable cloud hosting.”

They say if you build it, they will come. And with such pompous poo-poo being delivered by local media, come they did! As a result, the huge number of visitors appears to have swamped the police.uk site with traffic, causing it to break. Search results were returning error messages, or a blank page with a 503 Service Unavailable response header.

It is reputed to be on Amazon's cloud hosting.

Group buying service Groupon has resorted to a different tactic. Groupon blocks customer logins during high-traffic periods when running national deals. If you attempt to login to make a purchase, print a coupon or view your account, a page appears stating that the login functionality is not available due to extremely high demand. They suggest you make an order using the same email address as on your account. There is concern that Groupon’s deal bucks might not be applied to purchases since they aren’t logged in (there is a fine print notice that deal bucks will be applied if they are in your account when your order is processed).

The other issue with no ability to login is that you can’t easily print or retrieve your purchased Groupons. The message on the login page does provide an email address if you need to print or redeem a Groupon immediately but I have to imagine that email address will be hammered.

The price of success!

Alternatively, the businesses delivering your residential/business internet packages make no claims of unlimited, cheap, nor fast services. They do spend exorbitant amounts of money repackaging and marketing the same products with claims that appear less expensive than that of their competitor. On the plus side, those exorbitant internet prices are some what offset by the positive and lightening fast customer service experiences of those very few that might find themselves needing to call “client care”. Right.... right!

An interesting PR campaign from Netflix, which is fighting with the cable guys and telcos over the cost of delivering all that streaming video to your living room: The company is going to publish a list of broadband Internet providers, ranked by performance.

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings statements can be summarized in a sentence... If the broadband guys insist on gouging us to get video to our customers, we’re going to make a very public stink.

Interesting concept that a webhost attempts to convince potential clients that they can provide unlimited bandwidth for little or nothing... while the internet providers attempt to convince you that it will cost the sun, moon, and stars. We will publish the list when it appears

Here is Netflix warning/threat to the broadband business:

Recently the FCC adopted a version of net neutrality for wired networks in the U.S., and it’s a step in the right direction. The focus is on fair-play within an ISP’s network, but does not explicitly address entry into the ISP’s network.

Delivering Internet video in scale creates costs for both Netflix and for ISPs. We think the cost sharing between Internet video suppliers and ISPs should be that we have to haul the bits to the various regional front-doors that the ISPs operate, and that they then carry the bits the last mile to the consumer who has requested them, with each side paying its own costs. This open, regional, nocharges, interchange model is something for which we are advocating. Today, some ISPs charge us, or our CDN partners, to let in the bits their customers have requested from us, and we think this is inappropriate. As long as we pay for getting the bits to the regional interchanges of the ISP’s choosing, we don’t think they should be able to use their exclusive control of their residential customers to force us to pay them to let in the data their customers’ desire. Their customers already pay them to deliver the bits on their network, and requiring us to pay even though we deliver the bits to their network is an inappropriate reflection of their last mile exclusive control of their residential customers.

Conversely, this open, regional, no-charges model should disallow content providers like Netflix and ESPN3 from shutting off certain ISPs unless those ISPs pay the content provider. Hopefully, we can get broad voluntary agreement on this open, regional, no-charges, interchange model. Some ISPs already operate by this open, regional, no-charges, interchange model, but without any commitment to maintain it going forward.

Tomorrow, we’ll publish on our blog ongoing performance statistics about ISPs collected from our 20 million subscribers detailing which ISPs provide the best, most-consistent high speed internet for streaming Netflix. We can tell you now, though, that for our subscribers streaming Netflix, Charter is the highest-performance ISP in the United States.

Recently, there was a report that at peak times Netflix subscribers in the U.S. were driving about 20% of peak downstream last-mile Internet traffic. This may or may not be accurate, but it should be noted that because we pay for the data to be delivered to regional ISP front doors, little of this traffic goes over the Internet or ISP backbone networks, thereby minimizing ISP costs, avoiding congestion, and improving performance for end-using consumers.

An independent negative issue for Netflix and other Internet video providers would be a move by wired ISPs to shift consumers to pay-per-gigabyte models instead of the current unlimited-up-to-a-large-cap approach. We hope this doesn’t happen, and will do what we can to promote the unlimited-up-to-alarge-cap model. Wired ISPs have large fixed costs of building and maintaining their last mile network of residential cable and fiber.

The ISPs’ costs, however, to deliver a marginal gigabyte, which is about an hour of viewing, from one of our regional interchange points over their last mile wired network to the consumer is less than a penny, and falling, so there is no reason that pay-per-gigabyte is economically necessary. Moreover, at $1 per gigabyte over wired networks, it would be grossly overpriced.

A number of sites are blogging about spammers exploiting a cPanel vulnerability at Utah-based hosting company Hostmonster, which is owned by Bluehost. The targets of the alleged abuse were high profile domains belonging to educational, financial and public institutions.

Bluehost co-founder Danny Ashworth told Krebs on Security that an attacker exploited the cpanel vulnerability to create rogue subdomains on dozens of domain names hosted by the company.

The subdomains point to pages used in black hat search engine optimization (BHSEO) campaigns to poison search results. This method involves creating pages filled with keywords for a particular search topic, a technique referred to as keyword stuffing, on domains with a solid PageRank.

The spammer was able to create subdomains between April and July 2010, when Hostmonster addressed the initial security issue, but they remained online until recently.

“We added and altered some security measures in July for another issue that we found which also fixed the CPanel bug that allowed this exploit to take place, [and] although it did not allow additional records to be created/altered, it did not remove the entries that existed,” Ashworth said.

The blog Unmask Parasites has some great tips in a post that highlights a recent and persistent variation of the Hostmonster attack.

It is being reported in the media that Web hosting provider Go Daddy ordered the removal of a controversial article that included the name of a former CIA agent in Pakistan.

In the first week of January, Go Daddy presented PakNationalists.com (redirects to ahmedquraishi.com) with an ultimatum, threatening the webmasters that they "either remove the content" or they could move their website to another Web host in 48 hours.

On 3 January, the American company gave the Pakistani website 48 hours to comply, and allegedly pulled the site down on 5 January. “Please be aware that this decision to remove the content is final, and is not up for debate,” said an email by the Abuse Department at GoDaddy.com

Jonathan Banks

The article discussed the potential court case against former CIA Islamabad station chief Jonathan Banks, who was accused of being behind the allegedly illegal drone attacks on areas of Pakistan.

Since Banks was allegedly in Pakistan on a business visa he does not have diplomatic immunity from prosecution. The CIA reportedly pulled Banks from Islamabad after he received death threats. Although the story was picked up by many large media outlets around the world, including several US websites, Go Daddy only ordered the Pakistanian site to take down the article.

A number of media outlets are reporting that the article was removed on January 5th but can still be viewed courtesy of the Google cache. You can also see the offending article from PakNationalists here.

"We inquired as to who could have made this complaint," said Gulpari Nazish Mehsud, a volunteer with PakNationalists. "The US company won't give us a name, but it doesn't take a genius to guess who is making the complaint."

A whois search shows the domain is still hosted with Go-Daddy and the site is live. Go figure! HostJury has sent an invitation for the webmaster of PakNationalists.com to clarify the facts as well as review their web hosting experiences with GoDaddy.

Update: response from Ahmad Quraishi, editor of PakNationalist

The site was reactivated after we removed the article on CIA and Jonathan Banks. The site remained down for six days and no amount of communication with godaddy.com helped.

They reactivated the site as soon as the article was removed. We've contacted their legal department and are discussing restoring the removed material because the same material continues to be hosted on major websites hosted in the US. This raises the specter of discrimination against us, and abuse by GoDaddy.com of its own ToS.

We were given 48 hours to remove the content, on 3 January, 2011.  As our offices were closed between 25 Dec and 8 Jan for the New Year holidays, we got the email on 9th, too late.

We protested this. We also protested the fact that this was no way of dealing with a client of three years. We also host, and manages several other domains linked to our business with godaddy.com

Our argument was that on urgent matters, you could use our emergency telephone number in their record, especially before taking an extreme step like pulling down a client's website, and that too on a frivolous reason that has nothing to do with Terms of Agreement. end

Ahmad Quraishi also linked to his personal blog for more details. Here he makes a number of valid statements including:

HostJury will continue to update this story as information becomes available.

Whois

Domain Name: AHMEDQURAISHI.COM
Registrar: GODADDY.COM, INC.
Whois Server: whois.godaddy.com
Referral URL: http://registrar.godaddy.com
Name Server: NS41.DOMAINCONTROL.COM
Name Server: NS42.DOMAINCONTROL.COm
Status: ok
Updated Date: 12-jan-2011
Creation Date: 18-dec-2005
Expiration Date: 18-dec-2013

Domain Name: PAKNATIONALISTS.COM
Registrar: GODADDY.COM, INC.
Whois Server: whois.godaddy.com
Referral URL: http://registrar.godaddy.com
Name Server: NS29.DOMAINCONTROL.COM
Name Server: NS30.DOMAINCONTROL.COM
Status: clientDeleteProhibited
Status: clientRenewProhibited
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Updated Date: 14-sep-2008
Creation Date: 14-sep-2008
Expiration Date: 14-sep-2013

Facebook, Google, and Yahoo are joining Akamai, and Limelight Networks, along with the Internet Society, for the first global-scale trial of the new Internet Protocol, IPv6. On June 8, 2011, dubbed “World IPv6 Day,” participants will enable IPv6 on their main services for 24 hours. With IPv4 addresses running out this year, the industry must act quickly to accelerate full IPv6 adoption or risk increased costs and limited functionality online for Internet users everywhere. The companies are coming together to help motivate organizations across the industry eg: Internet service providers, hardware manufacturers, operating system vendors and other web companies, to prepare their services for the transition.

IPv4 has a total of approximately four billion IP addresses (the sequence of numbers assigned to each Internet-connected device). The explosion in the number of people, devices and web services on the Internet means that IPv4 is running out of space. IPv6, the next-generation Internet protocol, which provides over four billion times more space, will connect the billions of people not connected today and will help ensure the Internet can continue its current growth rate. Once Ipv6 is deployed, connections with no IPv6 address will only be able to browse the IPv4 internet only. You will not be able to reach IPv6-only sites.

Website Owners

If you'd like to bring your company's website online using IPv6 during the World IPv6 Day you'll need to make it IPv6 accessible using dual stack technology and provide a AAAA record for the site. IPv4 websites will of course continue to be accessible over IPv4 during the event. Contact us and provide us some information about your plans to participate and we will add your site to the list of participating sites.

This is a 24 hour event June 8, 2011, from 0000 to 2359 UTC. Websites will be operating over IPv6 for 24 hours on this date. On the day of the event we will provide a status dashboard of websites that have said they will participate. You'llbe able to check a website's IPv6 accessibility on the status dashboard.

Windows Vista and Windows 7 are both IPv6 ready. Mac OS X 10.5 and higher is fine. FreeBSD and Linux, all recent versions, are also fine. When your internet service provider offers IPv6 to you, these OSs are good. You may still need to replace your router (wireless or wired), if it is not aware of IPv6. You'll have to consult with your internet service provider on when IPv6 will be offered.

Windows XP users: plan on upgrading before using IPv6. It is technically possible to use IPv6 with XP, but only to a minimal extent.

Want to find out your IPv6 readiness? Use this test.

A media story out of Australian is a good reminder that even the most security conscious individual is still only as secure as the web host or service provider your information is hosted with. The personal details of millions of Vodafone customers, including their names, home addresses, driver's license numbers and credit card details, have been publicly available on the Internet in what is being described as an ''unbelievable'' lapse in security by the mobile phone giant.

It is being reported that personal details, call logs, and records were accessible from any computer, with a password and username because they are kept on an Internet site rather than on Vodafone's internal system. People have apparently obtained logins to check their spouses' communications.

Vodafone retailers and dealers are given a user name and password for the system. That access is shared by staff and every three months it is changed. Other mobile dealers who sell Vodafone products also get full access to the database. Vodafone dealers have revealed that they are frequently asked to do ''favors'' and to pass on their login details. Anyone with full access can look up a customer's bills and make changes to accounts. Limited access allows searching by name, which takes much longer and is more involved but can be just as effective when done correctly. '

Vodafone has ordered an immediate investigation and review of security procedures. ''Customer information is accessed through a secure web portal, accessible to authorized employees and dealers via a secure login and password. Any unauthorized access to the portal will be taken very seriously, and would constitute a breach of employment or dealer agreement and possibly a criminal offense. We will be conducting a thorough investigation of the matter with our internal security experts and will refer the matter to the Australian Federal Police if appropriate. All passwords would be reset, and training and other procedures would be reviewed.”a Vodafone spokesperson said.

Indian Web hosting company HostDepartment resorts to posting fake reviews on HostJury! A quick search of HostDepartment will quickly reveal that this webhost has been very efficient at controlling SEO and the page one result of search queries. HostDepartment could be considered one of the poorest rated webhosting companies reviewed on HostJury with support and uptime rated at less than ten percent. In an attempt to thwart the rating system, HostDepartment felt compelled to indulge in some ill conceived fraudulent reviews posting.

Nettlinx, the parent company of HostDepartment boasts on its website “ Through a series of strategic business moves, Host Department became the Tier 1 host the company is known as today.”... HostJury could argue that Host Department might want to rethink their strategy!

“Host Department thrives in an industry that is constantly reinventing itself.” … Alright, some could argue that solving issues could alleviate the need to reinvent!

“With innovations in customer service, ease of use, and special features for Host Department customers, the company continues to stay one step ahead of the competition.” … Posting fraudulent reviews is another

“Host Department employees take pride in offering some of the best 24 hour a day, customer-oriented support in the industry”.... Their forte is certainly not in posting fake review

HostDepartment merits joining a growing echelon of shamed webhosting companies such as iPower and AISO with the dubious esteemed stature of being caught posting fraudulent reviews.

 A Korean newspaper is reporting that a web hosting company head was supplementing his income by organizing cyber attacks to shut down rival gambling websites. The prosecution says that it arrested a server rental company head, 32-year-old Lee, and a hacker, 37-year-old Park, on charges of attacking gambling websites with distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) at the instigation of gangsters who operated an illegal gambling site on his company servers.

Lee and Park, who had managed the gang’s illegal gambling site, crippled 109 rival websites by attacking them with DDoS malware for one or two hours every day between Nov. 21 and Dec. 15 last year.

Lee was also alleged to have instigated a DDoS attacks on a job information website that rejected using his company’s web hosting services.

In what could only be described as a slow newsday, many of the media outlets are reporting and recycling as breaking “news”, some partisan political grandstanding that the governing federal conservative party of Canada owes the taxpayers $45 million for “partisan government advertising.”

Liberal critic Siobhan Coady released a mock invoice for the amount in reaction to a report by The Canadian Press that found the government went ahead with a Tory-blue website in spite of civil-service concerns.

The spectacle would have more merit had the same Liberals not been involved in another advertising scandal of their own making in recent memory. One, that their own former leader described as “civil servants who authorized paying advertising companies with close Liberal Party ties some $100 million in return for little or no work must have done so under political direction”. (Someone has to be asking ”What were you thinking”)

Viewing the “The Economic Action Plan ” website, my initial reaction was that this indeed is “butt a$$ ugly”, and reminiscent of much earlier web site design from the early 80's. The media articles had stated that the website had been the focus of criticism and complaints over what many say is its overtly partisan appearance and tone. I'll leave that to the pundits and readers to decide, but if true, would certainly explain the lack luster appeal of the ruling government party to the nations youth! Compare conservative.ca  vs actionplan.gc.ca

Without bias, I continued to objectively click through the links looking for the source of the “mock invoice”. While I was impressed with the speed of the servers (the gov has their own little cloud), I was unable to clearly see the source of the Liberal ire and what had prompted the mock invoice for $45 M.

I did manage to uncover a cost of $56,200 for creating the website, thanks to an astute inquiry by Sukh Dhaliwal, the Honorable member from Newton-North Delta BC. Hostjury has asked Sukh Dhaliwal office for more information on his findings.

IntoDNS also uncovered some potential security issues with the server configurations.

The website is not machine readable for the visually impaired and will require substantial modifications to meet these imposed guidelines. 

The site had a total of 31,891 unique visitors from November 2009 to November 2010. In November of 2010 there was 159 hits. Even the search engine robots appear to have found more interesting things to follow!

What many insiders (former clients) had already suspected was confirmed by New York‐based web hosting provider TurnKey Internet when it announced its acquisition of another NY web hosting provider, HostPC. The terms of the agreement were not disclosed but TurnKey is hoping this acquisition expands the TurnKey Internet web hosting brand.

HostPC customers now have access to improved performance, software features and overall speed with upgrades completed in December. “HostPC has trusted its network and server infrastructure to TurnKey Internet for years. TurnKey Internet presented a perfect fit to take HostPC to the next

level. This includes new higher speed servers and premium features at no additional cost, including R1soft continuous data protection backups, Softaculous auto installer, and a choice of cPanel or DirectAdmin Web hosting control panels.” said Joseph Mack, former CEO of HostPC.

Adam Wills, President and CEO of TurnKey Internet stated “HostPC web servers are already housed in our New York Datacenter, so clients will not need to make any changes going forward and will enjoy the new performance and features at no additional cost.”

Enough Press Release Jargon

In early September of 2010, clients of HostPC began to complain not only about the lagging response times to support quearies, but also of the cyrptic responses they did receive. Invoices from the paypal email also directed to TurnKeyInternet instead of HostPC.

As one former client stated "Oh well...too little, too late. I waited until a day before my renewal was up (middle of last month), then bailed.  A simple and truthful explanation of the reason behind some of the problems would have kept a lot of folks there. On the other hand, perhaps the goal all along was to weed out those who were grandfathered into the really cheap plans. Their cheapest plan is now $4.95/mo., which is still reasonable. But I don't need or want the illusion of "unlimited", so I'm fine with an even lower price." end quote

Clients of the new HostPC or the old TurnKey Internet are invited to share a review of their experiences.    

Canvas Dreams announced that they have acquired the assets of Taproot Hosting for an undisclosed amount. Canvas Dreams increases its client roster by 50 percent with the acquisition, while adding about 25 percent to its revenue stream, said David Anderson, principal of Canvas Dreams.

Canvas Dreams touts its use of 100 percent wind energy. Anderson said the two companies had been talking about different ways to cooperate before striking the acquisition deal at the end of 2010.

"Sustainability is always about cooperation over competition. We both utilize 100% renewable wind power, offer non-profit discounts, tree planting for every new customer, telecommuting options for our employees, and caring 24/7 customer support."

Anderson says he plans to leverage the larger client base and 10 full-time employees to launch some new services in the coming year.

With the New Year celebration now in full swing for some of us (soon to be followed by the rest of us), I thought I would write a sobering reminder that while you are off celebrating and ringing in the New Year, government types everywhere like to ring in the new year by sneaking in a host of new taxes and fees on every imaginable thing including your web hosting, and a few that you never imagined.

There may indeed be some logic in the notion that while much of the world is nursing a hangover on what is universally a official holiday, newsrooms and their patrons may actually miss that tax increase that will wreck havoc on household budgets in every quarter this coming year.

And it seems to work!

Every year when the credit card crunch comes in February, people grudgingly swear that next year they will spend less on Christmas! Nair a word is mentioned about those price increases perpetuated by the tax man.

And just as surely as old saint nick will be sneaking around your back stairs next xmas, those sinning publicans will be doing their slight of hand tricks next New Years eve also!

But here at HostJury, we don't want to rain on anyones festive celebrations or their parade. We just want to wish everyone everywhere, a happy, safe, and prosperous New Year!

Federal investigators appear to be following the trail of those allegedly responsible for launching a denial of service attack against PayPal earlier this month. The attack was instigated by a loosely bound Anonymous collective in response to Paypal decision to freeze an account used by WikiLeaks.

An affidavit obtained by the Smoking Gun contains testimony by federal agents convinced that systems at Texan hosting firm Tailor Made Servers are likely to contain clues in the hunt for the hackivists.

The affidavit shows that on December 9, PayPal provided FBI agents with eight IP addresses that were hosting an “Anonymous” Internet Relay Chat (IRC) site that was being used to organize denial of service attacks. The unidentified administrators of this IRC “then acted as the command and control” of a botnet army of computers that was used to attack target web sites.

One IP address was initially traced to Host Europe, a Germany-based Internet service provider. A search warrant executed by the German Federal Criminal Police revealed that the “server at issue” belonged to a man from France. A closer analysis of the server showed that “root-level access” to the machine “appeared to come from an administrator logging in from” another IP address....the server appears to have been hacked!

“Log files showed that the commands to execute the DDoS on PayPal actually came from a server at co-location facility provider Tailor Made Servers. It is being reported that agents copied two hard drives inside the targeted server on December 16, although there are no public court records detailing what was found on those drives, nor whether the information led to a suspect or, a continuing electronic trail.

A second IP address used by “Anonymous” was traced to FranTech Solutions, a VPS hosting provider out of British Columbia, Canada. Investigators with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police determined that the Canadian firm’s “virtual” server was actually housed at Hurricane Electric, a California firm offering “co-location, web hosting, and dedicated servers. The affidavit provides little details on any information that may have been gleamed from analyzing the server.

It is not uncommon for rooted severs to provide irc chatroom type environments. As seen with the recent activity, hackivists can utilize facebook, twitter, as well as numerous other methods of social media to relay communications...

A upgrade described as critical has been released for websites using WordPress. The WordPress team released the critical upgrade “WordPress 3.0.4” as a security update for a XSS vulnerability which may have allowed malicious attackers to revoke your access to the admin dashboard.

On the wordpress blog, Matt Mullenweg apologetically stated that an update during the holidays is no fun, but this one is worth putting down the eggnog for!

For both wordpress users and other, it is always a good time to remind users to make a manual backup of your websites. Most web hosting companies perform some form of nightly backup, but as many of the reviews on HostJury will attest, this is designed for the web hosts internal use in the event of a total loss of data. Do not hesitate to ask your webhost how to perform a manual backup if you any questions... eggnog or no eggnog!

This past year, HostJury has written a number of posts on DMC (The Digital Millennium Copyright Act ) takedown letters that claim violation of a copyright or trademark.  Cease and Desist letters demand that the offender must immediately comply with the request under threat of further legal action. These letters usually are sent to the webhost of the offending site demanding that the infringing materials be taken down.

Oftentimes these notices are sent out of a necessity to ensure that the copyright owners is proactive in consistently protecting their legal rights and there is also an assumption that a majority of notices are sent in good faith. But not always!

HostJury focused on the absurd antics of some characters in Takedown Letters can add buzz as well as a post about a Reviewer Caught Posting then sending a takedown letter. There were others including a number of stories about requests to take down sites sans the Cease and Desist letters.

DMCA Safe Harbors

Under the DMCA Safe Harbor Provisions, a web host would be required to remove questionable material if certain requirements are satisfied by the representative of the originator of the Cease and Desist notice. In order to ensure that copyright owners does not wrongly insist on the removal of materials that actually do not infringe their copyrights, the safe harbor provisions require web hosting service providers to notify the subscribers if their materials have been removed and to provide them with an opportunity to send a written notice to the service provider stating that the material has been wrongly removed.

The DMCA also states a subscriber can provides a proper "counter-notice" claiming that the material does not infringe copyrights, and the service provider must then promptly notify the claiming party of the individual's objection. If the copyright owner does not bring a lawsuit in district court within 14 days, the service provider is then required to restore the material to its location on its network.

A word of thanks to Dave Touretzky for providing a good example of a Do-It-Yourself Counter Notification Letter:

Dear Web Hosting Provider

This letter is written in response to your notification to me of a complaint received about my web page(s). The pages in question are:

(insert list of URLs here)

My response to this complaint is as follows: (include all that apply from list below)

Allegations of Copyright Violation / Digital Millennium Copyright Act

The claims of copyright violation should be rejected because:

> The material in question is not copyrighted, or the copyright has expired. It is therefore in the public domain and may be reproduced by anyone.

> The complainant has provided no copyright registration information or other tangible evidence that the material in question is in fact copyrighted, and I have a good faith belief that it is not. The allegation of copyright violation is therefore in dispute, and at present unsupported.

> The complainant does not hold the copyright to the material in question, is not the designated representative of the copyright holder, and therefore lacks standing to assert that my use of the material is a violation of any of the owner's rights.

> My use of the material is legally protected because it falls within the "fair use" provision of the copyright regulations, as defined in 17 USC 107. If the complainant disagrees that this is fair use, they are free to take up the matter with me directly, in the courts. You, as the webhost, are under no obligation to settle this dispute, or to take any action to restrict my speech at the behest of this complainant. Furthermore, siding with the complainant in a manner that interferes with my lawful use of your facilities could constitute breach of contract on your part.

>The complaint does not follow the prescribed form for notification of an alleged copyright violation as set forth in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, 17 USC 512(c)(3). Specifically, the complainant has failed to: 
 

- Provide a complaint in written form.
- Include a physical or electronic signature of the complainant.
- Identify the specific copyrighted work claimed to be infringed, or, if multiple copyrighted works are covered by a single complaint, provide a representative list of such works.
- Provide the URLs for the specific files on my web site that are alleged to be infringing.
- Provide sufficient information to identify the complainant, including full name, mailing address, telephone number, and email address.
- Include a written statement that the complainant has a good faith belief that use of the disputed material is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law.
- Include a written statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that the complainant is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.
 

This communication to you is a DMCA counter notification letter as defined in 17 USC 512(g)(3):

I declare, under penalty of perjury, that I have a good faith belief that the complaint of copyright violation is based on mistaken information, misidentification of the material in question, or deliberate misreading of the law.

My name, address, and telephone number are as follows:

(address here)

I hereby consent to the jurisdiction of Federal District Court for the judicial district in which I reside (or, if my address is outside the United States, any judicial district in which you, the webhost, may be found).

I agree to accept service of process from the complainant.

My actual or electronic signature follows:

(electronic or actual signature here)

Having received this counter notification, you are now obligated under 17 USC 512(g)(2)(B) to advise the complainant of this notice, and to restore the material in dispute (or not take the material down in the first place), unless the complainant files suit against me within 10 days.

A Twitter attack advertising acai-berries has hijacked thousands of Twitter accounts and turned them into spammers.

The attack is spreading at a rapid pace — within a minute, more than 10,000 tweets related to the attack have popped up on the microblogging service. These tweets link to domains containing “acainews.” and clicking the link may get you more than a way to lose nine pounds quickly!

There is speculation that the hack stems from another hack that was confirmed last night. Gawker Media has confirmed that their servers were rooted by a band of anonymous hackers known as Gnosis.

Gnosis gave a thumbs up to last week's Operation Payback, which targeted PayPal, MasterCard, Visa, and other companies that severed ties with WikiLeaks. A 20,000-word manifesto available by BitTorrent over the weekend contained email and Twitter log-in credentials for Nick Denton and other top knobs at Gawker, as well as logins for thousands of Gawker's registered readers.

The group also posted ““You would think someone like Nick Denton who likes to run his mouth and taunts such an unforgiving mass like Anonymous, would use a more secure password than '24862486. The sad thing is he probably believes this password is 'secure' because he likes to use it everywhere!” end quote.... Ouch!

Gawker's front page contained this warning saying: “Our user databases appear to have been compromised.” It advised readers to consider their accounts compromised across all of Gawker's federation of websites and to change passwords as soon as possible.” end

Change your passwords often

Changing your password both regularly, and utilizing an irregular mix of symbols, numbers, and both upper and lower case letters for complexity can not be overstated. Use one of the password safes available to store your passwords. Never use the same passwords at secure sites that you use at a site where you are posting comments! Some people at Gawkers are wishing they heeded what should now be common knowledge for anyone surfing the web.

Most e-commerce and donation based website likely have a neutral position from a business stance on the still unfolding WikiLeaks scenario. While the owners themselves may have a personal position, from a occupational pursuit perspective “business is business”

Yet only a person living in a cave on a remote island can escape the Wikileak news, and the ensuing groundswell and backlash that continues to grow against companies that have chosen to position themselves on a precarious ledge. These companies thought pattern seem obliviously at odds with the clientèle that placed them on top of the pile.

Paypal, and Amazon, and to a lesser extent EveryDNS, have by their actions infuriated many of the rank and file of the tech generation that empowered them to rise above their competition and be positioned in the forefront of their respective game. This growing groundswell may have game changing implications as many tech savvy citizens appear to be exercising their rights by choosing not to conduct business with these companies.

Many e-commerce competitors of Amazon may indeed be rubbing their keyboards in glee as this holiday season gets in full swing, but that may be short lived euphoria, if your site insists on offering only Paypal as the payment portal!

As much of Paypal success has hinged on their widespread acceptance in the marketplace, e-commerce and donation based sites might be wise to offer alternative payment solutions or risk losing revenue to competing websites that have wisely chosen to do so.

PayPal Alternatives... this list will continually be populated.

HostJury is not affiliated with, neither receives any renumeration from,  nor does it endorse any of the following companies.  

Feel free to add your alternative to Paypal as a comment... we will check it out and add it to the list!

allpay

Some media types are suggesting allpay as an alternative to Paypal for UK residents. We received the following email from their contact line:

Thank you for contacting allpay. Unfortunately we do not offer any services that are alternative to Paypal. At this moment in time we are unable to provide any services for e-commerce websites, should this change in the future I will be sure to contact you.

Regards,

moving on....

Google Checkout

Google Checkout is Google’s attempt at a replacement for PayPal.

Similar to PayPal, Checkout is a middle man solution – storing credit and debit cards in its system, and then using those to transfer funds to a a bank account.  With the ability to embed “buy now” buttons if shopping cart functionality isn’t needed. When Google Checkout was first cranked out it was not available to many customers which hindered its acceptance. This has changed and is now available North America, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, India and Singapore. I am sure this list will continue to grow.

Moneybooker.com 

Money Bookers is a UK based company,  and is authorized and regulated by the Financial Services Authority of the United Kingdom (FSA). They offer a number of benefits including sending money securely worldwide to anyone with an email address – even if the recipient does not have a Moneybookers account. Moneybookers already works with a large number of shop systems and solution providers.

Edit: For those who are looking for an alternative as a boycott of Paypal for it's reaction to WikiLeaks, Moneybooker.com will not be a viable choice... they cut their ties in August of 2010.

"Moneybookers terminated its relationship with WikiLeaks in August, claiming that the clandestine organisation had been placed on a US watchlist in the wake of damaging leaks about US activities in Afghanistan." 

Moving on....

Paymate

Paymate provides secure, reliable and innovative Internet-based payment services to buyers in 57 countries around the world and sellers in Australia, New Zealand and the USA. You can use Paymate to receive online payments via credit card, and like PayPal – you don’t need to have a merchant facility with a bank.

While originally setup for e-bay, it now integrates with Magento and has the ability to place a button on your site. Paymate also launched an Affiliate Marketing Program where you can earn money by simply referring new clients to them. HostJury has gracefully declined the offer!

Availability: Australia, USA, New Zealand

WePay

WePay needs to have a decent image that is easy to copy. While the site does look very user friendly, icons must have been at a premium  when they designed the site. No gif for WePay

WePay is a good tool to use if you are a group or organization collecting funds and accepting donations. WePay makes it easy to collect and manage money online. Unlike competitors, WePay allows users to keep their group's money in a dedicated account, and to share this account with their group. (or not). The service is great for roommates, clubs, organizations, fantasy leagues, teams, and much more.

Pros:
-Easy to use interface button can be placed on your site
-Users only need a credit card or bank account to donate; no other account is necessary
-Easy widgets allow you to integrate donations with existing sites or social sites like Facebook & Twitter
-All money is insured by the FDIC, so it has an added level of trust

Cons:
-WePay collects 3.5% of all transactions
-Currently, payments from outside the USA are not allowed although they hope to change this soon.

obopay

With Obopay you can instantly pay back a friend, split a dinner bill, get money from your parents, get quick cash, pay up or collect on a friendly wager, track purchases, check your balance, and much, much more. And, you can do it all from your phone; anywhere, anytime with anyone.

clickandbuy

Regardless of what merchandise or services you are selling, at ClickandBuy you can be sure of a solution that meets your requirements. As a result, you can make your services even easier to use for your customers, increasing your sales. Simply choose the ideal solution from four charging modules:

ClickandBuy transaction, ClickandBuy subscription, ClickandBuy billing agreement, ClickandBuy period-based charging.

A Monthly Fee is charged to maintain the account

Is any website safe? Will a web host arbitrarily decide the content of a user’s site is objectionable? Does a web host have the responsibility of setting standards for others? In the future will Amazon cloud hosting services, and other web hosts regulate themselves on user privacy, better business practices, and data protection before the government steps in?

Amazon,the online bookseller, which also provides web hosting services, has been criticized for being selective with its freedom of speech defenses. What is equally as troubling is the power one politician has to make a phone call and demand a private American internet company take down controversial material. Amazon stopped hosting WikiLeaks on its own servers within 24 hours after other webhosting services including every DNS were reportedly contacted by Homeland Security and Senator Joseph Lieberman.

In 2008 Joe Lieberman wrote to Google and demanded they remove “content” produced by an Islamist terrorist organization from YouTube because it demonstrated violence and hate speech. Google removed some of the YouTube videos.

This presents new questions. Maybe we are going to have to rewrite our First Amendment to include site hosting culpability. Will web hosts take down sites just because a government inquiry is made? Freedom of speech doesn’t give any of us the right to violate the law, but why weren’t the documents just removed? Why was the site shut down? There was no court order, nor was any Cease and Desist letter sent.

I am trying to follow the thought process of Amazon. The web hosting company was criticized for allowing the sale of child pornography on their site. Amazon spent days refusing to delete “The Pedophile’s Guide to Love and Pleasure” on free speech grounds, and defended their position by stating First Amendment rights give us the right not to shop with them. The story line is about a 32 year-old pastor sexually abusing a 15 year-old child. The author stated;

“ This is my attempt to make pedophile situations safer for those juveniles that find themselves involved in them, by establishing certain{sic} rules for these people to follow,” read the product description.

It wasn’t until a nationwide boycott was threatened with people complaining how Amazon could allow such garbage to be distributed solely for financial gain the ad was removed from the web site, however Japan Amazon reports it to be one of their best Kindle sales.

Amazon isn’t new to controversy either. In 2009 they stopped selling “Rape Lay,” a first person video game where the main character stalks and consequently rapes a mother and her daughters.

Amazon is currently accepting orders for “I Am the Market: How to Smuggle Cocaine by the Ton, in Five Easy Lessons” by Luca Rastello.

It is beyond reasonable comprehension to state that drugs, sex, and violence against children and women should not be included in Amazon’s TOS violations regarding web sites “otherwise injurious to third parties or objectionable.”

In their defense Amazon claims they do not pre-screen customers, but the terms of service must be followed. They claim that WikiLeaks did not follow their rules and shutting down the site had nothing to do with any government inquiry; rather it was the right decision, and they wanted to set standards for others.

For readers who want to ensure their websites are not shut down, review the TOS of your web host. Another part of Amazon’s TOS reads, “ You represent and warrant that you own or otherwise control all of the rights to the content … that use of the content you supply does not violate this policy and will not cause injury to any person or entity.”

With the growing debacle surrounding WikiLeaks, it will be interesting to view how many Amazon web hosting clients actually exercise their first amendment right not to conduct business with them

It’s disturbing to think an influential senator can tell a web host what can be on the internet. Less disturbing is the powerful influence of the internet when it flexes back.

We have all seen examples of where a company may feed off a customer mistaken identity. While there are sufficient examples of intentional and deceptive business practices perpetrated upon an unsuspecting public, more often than not it could be cited that its the cost of doing business in a increasingly global society.

Tech companies are no exception. A quick perusal of the host list will show Jumphost, JumpLaunch, and Jumpline. You have Canadian Web Hosting and Canada Web Hosting. We have posted numerous stories about court actions over brand confusion eg iron mountain or that perplexing one with amazon (cute)

"Hey Joe! Where do you have your DNS stuff handled?" "I dunno, Jim, EasyDNS, EveryDNS, something like that!"

Journalists from some major media outlets including the NY Times, the Financial Times, Gawker, and GigaOm have been repeatedly using the EasyDNS name in their stories about Wikileaks.

EasyDNS has spent the past few days alerting people via Twitter, the EasyDNS official blog, and in comments posted on the offending sites, that they were falsely accused, had nothing to do with Wikileaks, and did not, in fact, take the site down.

It now appears that EasyDNS is taking another approach. The company blog now states:

Ok, so would we take on Wikileaks DNS at this point?

So after the big clusterf*** with easyDNS being falsely blamed for taking down wikileaks, somebody posts the inevitable question "Would easyDNS take wikileaks DNS"? and from there makes what I think is a dubious extension: by NOT taking them we're doing the same thing as "taking them down".

What I find dubious about all this is it seems that we are being taken to task for this and held under a more rigorous scrutiny around this incident, than the company that actually did take them down.

Having said that, earlier today when after seeing YET ANOTHER BAD TWEET that wikileaks had setup wikileaks.ch on easyDNS, I called my systems group and told them I wanted the following conditions in place, so consider this:

An Open Letter to Wikileaks Regarding DNS Hosting

If they were to put their DNS here, then this is what we'd want to have in place:

1) An open channel of communication where we could communicate with their IT people 24/7, especially going into a weekend.

2) We'd prefer to be the domain registrar for the domain so we could have control over the nameserver delegations and would be able to move them around on-on-the-fly, as per the tactics I outlined in my previous posts about DOS attacks and DNS. Keeping in mind we are a non-US based registrar, we would adhere to Canadian law with respect to takedown requests, not DMCA or other US laws.

3) We'd want the domain to be one within a TLD that supports realtime updates, for the same reason.

4) We would want to initially limit their delegation to our nameservers deployed out on Prolexic, which is basically the most DOS-resistant stuff we have, possibly complimented with some ad-hoc standalone nodes.

That's basically how we would want to play it. Again, this is all hypothetical.

[ Note to Wikileaks: if you're reading this and want to add a domain after hours this weekend, email me direct markjr [at] you know what (and it's not everydns.net)" ]

Web host Rackspace evacuated its employees late Thursday, Dec. 2, after receiving a bomb threat against its Texas office complex.

The police and Fire Departments completed a sweep of the facility and determined that it was safe for employees to return to work Friday morning.

“Our Rackers (employees) are our first priority, and we appreciate their patience as we took precautions and evacuated the Castle facility to ensure their safety,” says Samantha Moreno, spokesperson for Rackspace. “We take these threats seriously and we appreciate their patience as we took precautions and evacuated the Castle facility to ensure their safety.”

At this time there is no word whether the bomb threat was the work of a bored, or deranged person, an “ex-racker” (or current racker with a hot date), or a disgruntled client.