Web Hosting Terms of Service and Acceptable Use Policy

Our web hosting services are subject the following Terms of Service and Acceptable Use Policy.

Terms of Service

J4 Multimedia Pty Ltd (“Go4”) provides website hosting services to clients (“you”), subject to the following TOS (“Terms of Service”) and AUP (“Acceptable Use Policy”).

Contact Information

You agree to provide Go4 with accurate and complete contact information. Contact information means any data relating to your identity, email, and street address, or telephone number, or any other information that you provide to Go4 in order for the processing of your service order, to receive or to continue receiving services. Further, you agree to provide Go4 with updated contact information within a reasonable period of time following the change in circumstance that creates the need for updated information.

Payments and Fees

Establishment of this service is dependent upon receipt by Go4 of payment of stated charges. Subsequent payments are due on a recurring annual date that coincides with the signup date. The accepted methods of payment are cheque, direct bank deposit or credit card via Paypal. Paypal payments incur a processing fee. When performing a direct bank deposit you are required to enter your Go4 invoice number into the reference field to enable us to identify the payment thus and attribute it to you.

Service suspension will be applied to accounts that reach 14 days past due. Repeated late payment of account will not be afforded repeated 14 day grace period prior to suspension. If we don’t hear from you after 28 days your hosting service will be terminated.

Service/Hosting Account Cancellation

You may cancel your service with Go4 at any time. You agree to and understand that account cancellation advice to Go4 will only be accepted if the account is paid up to date with no outstanding amounts owed. If a cancellation request has been submitted while invoices are unpaid the request will be automatically removed and you will need to resubmit the cancellation request after any outstanding invoices are paid.

For your protection you agree to submit service cancellations by email so we have a record of this.

You agree that unless Go4 has replied acknowledging the cancellation email and confirming all invoices have been paid up to date, then the service can not be deemed as being cancelled.

Bandwidth

You agree that bandwidth usage shall not exceed the number of gigabytes per month for the services for your plan. If any sudden and unexpected bandwidth overusage occurs Go4 believes in communicating with you and will try to work with you to resolve any overage issues before taking action which could cause your service to become unavailable.

Bandwidth usage is measured on a monthly basis.

In the event that you exceed the allowable bandwidth limit, Go4 will request you to upgrade to the next higher hosting plan. If you fail to upgrade a fee for over usage may be charged.

Unused bandwidth allocations cannot be carried over to future months, or applied to other services.

Disk Usage

You agrees that disk usage shall not exceed the number of megabytes for your plan. If storage exceeds account limits Go4 believes in communicating with you and will try to work with you to resolve any overage issues before taking action which could cause your service to become unavailable.

Note that keeping all emails on  your hosting account indefinitely may cause your disk usage to exceed account limits. This can happen when accessing emails via SMTP on mobile devices.

You acknowledge that Go4 may suspend backups (see Data Backups below) if account exceeds disk space allocated.

No Spam Policy (NSP)

Go4 takes a zero tolerance approach to the sending of Unsolicited Commercial Email (UCE) or spam over our network. Very simply this means that customers of Go4 may not use or permit others to use our network to transact in UCE. Clients of Go4 may not host, or permit hosting of, sites or information that is advertised by UCE from other networks. In addition, it is not acceptable to transmit bulk email through remote SOCKS, HTTP or other similar proxies who in turn make a SMTP connection to the destination mail servers. This technique may result in account suspension or termination. Violations of this policy carry severe penalties, including termination of service. In order to prevent unnecessary blacklisting due to spam we reserve the right to occasionally sample bulk email being sent from servers.

  • Violation of Go4 email policy, as outlined in the Terms Of Service (“TOS”) and Acceptable Use Policy (“AUP”) will result in severe penalties.
  • Upon notification of an alleged violation of our AUP, Go4 will initiate an immediate investigation (within 72 hours of notification).
  • During the investigation, Go4 may restrict customer access to the network to prevent further violations.
  • If a customer is found to be in violation of our TOS or AUP, Go4 may, at its sole discretion, restrict, suspend or terminate customer’s account.
  • Further, Go4 reserves the right to pursue civil remedies for any costs associated with the investigation of a substantiated policy violation.
  • Go4 will notify law enforcement officials if the violation is believed to be a criminal offence.
  • First violations of this policy will result in an Administrative Fee of $220 inc GST and your account will be reviewed for possible immediate termination. A second violation will result in an Administrative Fee of $550 inc GST and immediate termination of your account. Users who violate this policy agree that in addition to these Administrative penalties, they will pay Research Fees not to exceed $110 per hour that Go4 personnel must spend to investigate the matter.

Refund and Disputes

Payments to Go4 are non refundable. This includes one time setup fees, prepayment fees, and subsequent charges regardless of usage. You shall not be entitled to any refunds, pro-rated or otherwise, in the event of early termination of this agreement by Go4 according to the terms herein.

Pursuant to this, if you have intentionally obtained a service from Go4 with the specific intent to then dispute the charge to enable you to utilise the service from us without paying for it (theft of service), it will be considered an act of fraudulent activity. Action against you as deemed appropriate by law enforcement authorities will be fully supported by Go4 together with action against you to recover all costs incurred by Go4 in pursuit of exercises undertaken to recover that which owed to us for providing the service to you.

Data Backups

Go4 takes the backup of your data very seriously. However, this backup provisioning is performed as a courtesy only. You agree that Go4 is not responsible for the completeness, integrity, or freshness of data backup. You agree to hold Go4 harmless and not responsible for any damage or loss of business or any costs arising from our backup systems failing in any way for whatever reason.

The following backup arrangements apply:

Premium Australian Hosting Accounts

Full cPanel backups including website files, mySQL databases and emails are taken every two days on server and a copy is stored externally once a week. We keep copies of these backups in two separate locations for at least six weeks.

No matter which hosting plan we encourage you to use your own backup regime, either via the powerful account level backup functions within cPanel – which gives you  the ability to directly create full site backups and then to download/store these in a location of your choice – or via another method. 

All backup services, whether provided or optional, are dependant on many components working correctly. Therefore, you agree to hold Go4 harmless and not responsible or liable for any loss of data, damage of loss of business or any cost arising from our backup systems failing in any way for whatever reason. You agree to totally indemnify Go4 from any liability, responsibility and/or cost arising from any failure of any backup system and/or service for any reason.

You acknowledge that the service provided is of such a complex nature which sees countless third party hardware, software and network provider identities contribute, that service can be interrupted or halted for many reasons. Therefore, you specifically agrees that Go4 shall not be liable or responsible for any damages or costs arising from any outage or any failure of service for any reason whatsoever.

You agree that in no event whatsoever shall Go4 be liable or responsible for any special or consequential damages, loss, injury or cost for any reason.

You also acknowledge that Go4 may suspend backups if account exceeds disk space or bandwidth allocated.

Service Interruptions

You agree that Go4 is not liable or responsible for any damages and/or costs your business may suffer due to an outage or service interruption. This includes service interruptions caused by Go4 and/or any of the third party software and/or hardware service providers who contribute to make the service possible irrespective of whether the cause is hardware related, software related, network related or human action related, whether internal or external, or act of God or for any other reason.

Hacking

You acknowledge that the use of software such WordPress and other similar types of third party open source software can represent potential risk, and as such requires you to play a part in maintaining your chosen software. Therefore, you agree to take steps to ensure you keep you or their chosen software updated to the latest release and security patched where applicable.

You agree to utilise and implement security measures as per advice from the developers/publishers of the third party software installed onto your hosting account/s on the server. You agree that under no circumstances shall Go4 be liable for any damages, loss or costs arising from or associated with the result of any third party or otherwise software you have chosen to install into a hosting account becoming compromised (hacked) that may result in the destruction of data on the server whether this is the result of your or your  chosen software becoming compromised or for any other reason whatsoever. You explicitly agree not to hold Go4 responsible or liable in any manner whatsoever for any damages, loss or costs arising from or associated with any type of data becoming deleted and/or unrecoverable due to any type of compromise or hack irrespective of how the compromise or hack occurred.

Account access by other developers

Go4 only provides hosting services for websites that we manage. Unless agreed in writing Go4 will not provide ftp or control panel access to third-party developers.

We reserve the right to suspend or remove hosting accounts if insecure themes, plugins, scripts, or security practices are being used.

Plugin licenses

For websites that we actively manage or work on we may allow shared use of some commercial plugin licenses. This does not apply if third-party developers are granted access to work on your site, in which case it will be your responsibility or your developer’s responsibility to purchase and manage these licenses.

Non-Waiver

You agree that Go4’s failure at any time to enforce any of the provisions of this TOS or AUP or any right or remedy available hereunder, or at law or equity, or to exercise any option herein provided, shall in no way be construed to be a waiver of such provisions, rights, remedies, or options or in any way to affect the validity of this TOS or AUP. The exercise by Go4 of any rights, remedies, or options provided hereunder, or at law or equity, shall not preclude or prejudice Go4 from exercising thereafter the same or other rights, remedies, or options.

Force Majeure

You agree that Go4 is not responsible for any damages, costs, delays, or other failures to fulfil its obligations hereunder as a result of war, fire, strike, riot or insurrection, natural disaster, delay of carriers, governmental order or regulation, complete or partial shutdown of plant, unavailability of materials or equipment from suppliers, failures of backups, labour disputes, uplink network failures, external actions and/or other occurrences whether beyond or within its control whether or not similar to those listed above.

Assignment

Neither this TOS or AUP nor any of the rights, interests or obligations hereunder may be assigned by you (whether by operation of law or otherwise) without the prior written consent of Go4. Go4 may assign this TOS or AUP without the consent of you. Subject to the foregoing, this TOS/AUP shall be binding upon, inure to the benefit of and be enforceable by the parties and their respective successors and permitted assigns.

Refusal of Service

Go4 reserves the right to refuse service to anyone at any time for any reason and you further agree that Go4 is not obliged to furnish reasons for such actions.


Acceptable Use Policy

Go4’s Acceptable Use Policy (“AUP”) has been designed to assist in protecting Go4 and its clients from improper and/or illegal activity over the Internet and to further compliance with all relevant laws and regulations. This AUP is also intended to establish a clear understanding of what Go4 expects of clients using our services.

Go4’s AUP is applicable to any and all access or use of Go4 services (the “Service”) or Go4 network (the “Network”). This includes, but is not limited to, any use or access by (a) Go4 clients, (b) Go4 clients’ clients, members, end-users, and agents and (c) any other parties who use or access the Service or Network (collectively, “Users”).

All Users must comply with this AUP. Any access or usage of the Service or Network constitutes acceptance and agreement to this AUP. Each client of Go4 agrees that it is responsible for violations of this AUP by itself and by any party that uses or access the services or the network through such client, whether authorised by you or not.

Go4 supports the uncensored flow of information and ideas and does not exercise editorial control over the content of any web site, e-mail transmission, newsgroups, or other material created or accessible over or through the Service, except for certain proprietary web sites. However, in accordance with our TOS (Terms of Service), we may remove any materials that, in our sole discretion, may be illegal, may subject us to liability, or which may violate this AUP. Go4 may cooperate with legal authorities and/or third parties in the investigation of any suspected or alleged crime or civil wrong doing.

Go4 believes in communicating with our clients and will try to work with our clients to resolve any AUP violations before taking action which could cause a service to become unavailable. However, due to the nature or severity of some violations, such as the injection of illegal phishing sites or pages, this is not always possible or preferable. We reserve the right to immediately suspend or terminate, without warning, services to a client who is in violation of the AUP.

The following activities are expressly prohibited, and are considered violations of the AUP. These descriptions are guidelines and are not intended to be exhaustive. Go4 will be the sole arbiter as to what constitutes as unacceptable use.

Illegal Activity or Content

The Service shall not be used for any unlawful activities or in connection with any criminal or civil violation. Use of the Service or Network for transmission, distribution, retrieval, or storage of any information, data or other material in violation of any applicable law or regulation (including, where applicable, any tariff or treaty) is prohibited. This includes, without limitation, the use or transmission of any data or material protected by copyright, trademark, trade secret, patent or other intellectual property right without proper authorisation and the transmission of any material that constitutes an illegal threat, violates export control laws, or is obscene, defamatory or otherwise unlawful.

This also includes, without limitation, the use of Services to display illegal phishing sites and or pages whether such sites and or pages exist with or without the knowledge of the website hosting account owner. The hosting account responsible for facilitating the display of illegal phishing sites will be immediately suspended in the first instance to remove the threat then if action has not been taken by you to rectify matters, the site will be terminated.

Network Abuse

Go4 expressly prohibits any activities that, in its sole discretion, constitute network abuse. This includes, but is not limited to:

  • Denial of Service attacks or any activities designed to exhaust the resources of a host or network.
  • Any attempt to monitor data or traffic on any network or system without the authorization of the owner of the system or network.
  • Accessing, illegally or without authorisation, computers, accounts or networks belonging to another party, or attempting to penetrate security measures of another individual’s system.
  • Port-scanning, vulnerability scanning, and any other activity that may be used as a precursor to an attempted system penetration.
  • Introducing malicious programs into any network or server, such as viruses, worms, trojan horses, and key loggers.
  • Intentionally or negligently injecting false data into the Internet, for instance in the form of bad routing information or incorrect DNS information.
  • Forging any e-mail message header, in part or whole, of any electronic transmission, originating or passing through the Network.
  • Executing any form of network activity that will intercept data not intended for your server.

Unsolicited Email

Go4 expressly prohibits any use of unsolicited email (Further to our No Spam Policy as detailed in T.O.S.)

Users are prohibited from engaging in improper use or distribution of email. Go4 will be the sole arbiter as to what constitutes a violation of this provision. This includes, but is not limited to:

  • Sending of any unsolicited email (“spam”). Any message sent to a recipient from a purchased, rented, licensed, or traded list of email addresses is automatically considered unsolicited.
  • Hosting web pages advertised within “spam e-mail” sent from another network (“spamvertising”)
  • Using the Service to receive replies from unsolicited emails (“drop-box” accounts).
  • Configuring any email server in such a way that it will accept third party emails for forwarding (“open mail relay”).
  • Running Unconfirmed Mailing Lists.
  • Subscribing email addresses to any mailing list without the express and verifiable permission of the email address owner is prohibited.
  • All mailing lists run by Go4 Users must be Closed-loop (“Double Opt-in”).
  • Purchasing lists of email addresses from 3rd parties for mailing to from any Go4 hosted domain, or referencing any Go4 account, is prohibited.
  • Operating an account on behalf of, or in connection with, or reselling any service to, persons or firms listed in the Spamhaus Register of Known Spam Operations (ROKSO) database at www.spamhaus.org

IRCs and Proxy Servers

All IRC activity is prohibited. This includes running any type of IRC software including, but not limited to, IRC Client software, IRC server software, web-based IRC software, IRC bots such as “eggdrop”, and IRC proxies such as “psyBNC”.

Proxy Servers are prohibited. This includes, but is not limited to, SOCKS proxies, Squid proxies, Bittorrent Proxies, Tor, and any CGI or PHP proxy scripts.

Facilitating a Violation of this Policy

Advertising, transmitting, or otherwise making available any software, program, product, or service that is designed to violate this AUP, which includes, but is not limited to, the facilitation of the means to send unsolicited bulk email, initiation of pinging, flooding, mail-bombing, denial of service attacks.

Service Performance & Over Usage Abuse

Excessive use or abuse of resources by one hosting account may have a negative impact on other customers. You are prohibited from excessive consumption of resources, including CPU and memory. The definition of this is when a single hosting account consumes in excess of 5% of the total CPU power of the main server for a non-stop excessively long period of time. You may not use resource-intensive programs which negatively impact other customers or the performances of the Service or Network. For the protection of others who utilise Go4 services, Go4 reserves the right to limit such activities as it sees fit.

Reporting Violations of Go4 AUP

Go4 requests that anyone who believes that there is a violation of this AUP direct the information to support@go4.com.au

If available, please provide the following information:

  • The IP address used to commit the alleged violation
  • The date and time of the alleged violation, including the time zone or offset from GMT
  • Evidence of the alleged violation
  • An email with full header information provides all of the above, as do system log files. Other situations will require different methods of providing the above information.

Go4 may take any one or more of the following actions in response to complaints:

  • Issue written or verbal warnings
  • Disable access to your content which violates AUP
  • Remove content which violates AUP
  • Block email or any other network service
  • Null-route your IP address
  • Suspend your account
  • Terminate your account
  • Bill you for administrative costs and/or reactivation charges
  • Bring legal action to enjoin violations and/or to collect damages, if any, caused by violations

The aforementioned list of actions shall not be construed in any way to limit the actions or remedies that Go4 may take to enforce and ensure compliance with this AUP. Go4 reserves the right to recover any and all expenses, and apply any reasonable charges, in connection with your violation of this AUP.

Contact

Please direct all questions regarding this TOS and/or AUP to info@go4.com.au.