Acceptable Use Policy

Who this applies to

This policy covers every Drewcotech Cloud Hosting ("DCH") service: virtual machines, hosted websites and web apps, online stores, myDCH, the client area, and the AI assistant connection used to manage your virtual machine.

It applies to you as the account holder, and to anyone you let use your services, including your staff, your customers, your site's visitors where they can post content, and any AI assistant acting for you. You're responsible for what happens on your services, so make sure the people and tools you allow in follow these rules too.

Illegal content

Don't use DCH to host, send or link to anything that's illegal, or to plan or carry out illegal activity.

Harm to people

Don't use DCH to:

• Harass, threaten, bully or intimidate anyone.
• Publish someone's private information, such as their home address, phone number or ID documents, without their permission ("doxxing").
• Share intimate images of anyone without their consent.
• Encourage or glorify violence, self-harm or terrorism, or recruit for violent groups.
• Target people with hate based on who they are, including race, ethnicity, religion, disability, sex, gender identity or sexual orientation.
• Sexualize minors in any way, or let minors reach sexually explicit material on your site.

Fraud and deception

Don't use DCH to trick people. That includes:

• Phishing pages or anything built to collect passwords, payment details or personal information under false pretenses.
• Pretending to be another person, business, school or government body.
• Scams, fake stores, fake giveaways, and pyramid or "get rich quick" schemes.
• Selling counterfeit goods, or goods you can't or won't deliver.
• Fake reviews, fake documents, or misleading claims about what you're offering.

Security and network abuse

Don't use DCH to attack or interfere with any computer, network or account, ours or anyone else's. That means no:

• Hosting or spreading malware, ransomware or exploit kits.
• Running botnets or command-and-control servers.
• Denial-of-service attacks, or sending traffic meant to overwhelm a service.
• Scanning, probing or breaking into systems you don't have written permission to test.
• Guessing or stuffing passwords against other people's accounts.
• Running open proxies, open mail relays or other services that let strangers hide their activity behind your server.

Security testing is welcome on systems you own or are authorized to test. If you're planning something that might look like an attack, such as a load test or penetration test against your own site, tell us first at [email protected] so it isn't mistaken for one.

Spam

Don't send or promote unsolicited bulk messages, whether by email, text, chat, comments or forms, and don't host sites that are advertised that way. Mailing lists must be ones people chose to join, and they must be able to leave easily.

Fair use of resources

DCH is shared infrastructure, so what you run shouldn't get in the way of other customers. Please don't:

• Mine cryptocurrency.
• Use your services in a way that degrades the host or other customers' services, such as runaway processes or disk-filling logs. If your project needs more room, ask us and we'll find a bigger fit.
• Try to break out of your virtual machine, reach the host, or access anything that belongs to another customer.
• Get around limits, suspensions or reviews we've put in place, including by opening another account.

Network use

Network use is included with DCH. We don't normally charge for bandwidth or data transfer, and most customers never pay a cent for it.

There are two exceptions. In these cases, you pay for network use on top of your plan, at the rate we agree with you before you start:

• CDN-style use. Using DCH mainly to deliver files, images, video, downloads or other content for other sites or services, or as a content delivery network of your own.
• Adult content. Any site we've approved to host adult content (see Adult content).

Everything else: no network charges. If you're not sure which side of the line your project falls on, ask us at [email protected] before you launch.

Large projects

Some projects are big enough that we set them up under a contract with you, such as a large multiplayer game or anything else that needs a significant share of our capacity.

Before we sign, the account holder must verify their identity with Stripe Identity, a government ID check run by Stripe. We waive this only in very rare circumstances, at our sole discretion.

Accounts and access

• Keep your credentials secret. Your myDCH login, client-area login and AI access token are yours alone. Don't post them, share them or put them in public code.
• Your AI assistant acts for you. Anything done with your access token, including by an AI assistant you've connected, counts as done by you.
• Tell us about leaks right away. If you think a credential or token has been exposed, email [email protected] and we'll revoke it and issue a new one.
• Keep your contact details current so we can reach you about your services, including abuse reports.

Online stores

Every eCommerce site on DCH is manually reviewed by Drewcotech before it can take orders. To pass review and stay open, your store must:

• Accurately describe what you sell, including its price and condition.
• Ship or deliver what customers pay for, in the time you promise.
• Clearly explain your refund, return and shipping terms, and follow them.
• Give customers a working way to contact you.
• Not sell anything illegal, or anything that legally requires age checks or a license, such as weapons, drugs, alcohol or tobacco, unless you have them and we've agreed to it.

We may review a store again at any time, for example after a complaint, and pause orders while we do.

Adult content

No pornography or erotica of any kind without written permission from DCH first. That covers images, video, audio, written stories, AI-generated material, and sites built mainly to link to any of these.

Before we consider your request, you must verify your identity and age with Stripe Identity, a government ID check run by Stripe. This applies to anyone setting up a site with pornography or erotica, or a site that links to it. This requirement is never waived.

If we give permission, you also agree to:

• Pay for network use on that site, at the rate we agree with you (see Network use).
• Only feature people who are adults and who consented, both to the content and to it being published.
• Keep minors out, including any age verification the law requires where your visitors are.
• Follow every other law that applies to adult content, including any record-keeping requirements.

Adult content found on DCH without permission is removed and the service is suspended. Getting permission doesn't change anything else in this policy. The rules on illegal content, harm to people and non-consensual images still apply in full.

House rules

Some of these are oddly specific. There's usually a story behind them. On DCH, don't:

• Host fight clips or fight videos. ZERO. None, ever, for any reason. That means no uploading, storing, sharing or linking to them anywhere on DCH or the Drewcotech CDN (dctcdn.com), and that includes "just for the group chat." A high school once uploaded 82 GB of fight videos to our CDN. Never again.
• Vandalize Wikipedia, or any other wiki. Edits from our IP addresses can get those addresses blocked for every customer who shares them. Yes, this has happened.
• Host proxies or "unblocker" sites built to get around school or workplace web filters. Drewcotech makes school filters. We're not going to host the way around them.
• Run Discord raid bots, server-nuke bots or self-bots, or anything else that spams, mass-joins or wrecks someone else's community.
• Tell your AI assistant to restart your virtual machine "until it works." If it's still broken after a restart or two, email us.
• Run a game server on a virtual machine you bought for a website without asking us first. We'll happily set you up with one that's sized for it.
• Copy our "service suspended" or "maintenance" pages onto your own site to fake an outage. People will think it's real, and they'll email us.
• Run VPN servers, for yourself or anyone else.
• Resell or rent out your DCH servers to anyone else, including running your own hosting or "cloud" service on top of them. Someone opened a cloud host on our servers last month. Once was enough.
• Absolutely no retail botting from our IP addresses. That means no bots that buy up tickets, sneakers, consoles or any other limited stock, no automated checkouts, and no "cook groups" running through DCH.

Copyright and trademarks

Only host content you have the right to use. Don't host pirated software, films, music, games or books, or use someone else's brand in a way that suggests they're behind your site. If we get a valid complaint about your content, we'll pass it on to you and may remove the content while it's sorted out.

Reporting abuse

If you see something on DCH that breaks this policy, email [email protected]. Please include:

• The web address or IP address involved.
• What's happening and when you noticed it.
• Any evidence, such as screenshots, email headers or log lines.

Never send us child sexual abuse material, even as evidence. Send the address only, and report the material directly to NCMEC's CyberTipline or your local police.

If someone is in immediate danger, contact your local emergency services first.

Enforcement

When something breaks this policy, we may:

• Ask you to fix it by a deadline.
• Remove or disable the content involved.
• Pause orders on an online store.
• Suspend some or all of your services.
• End your services and close your account.

We'll usually contact you first and give you a chance to fix the problem. For serious or urgent cases, such as child sexual abuse material, cyberbullying, active attacks, malware or phishing, we act right away and contact you afterwards.

Suspended sites show a Drewcotech Cloud Hosting notice explaining that they've been suspended. If you think we've made a mistake, reply to our message or email [email protected] and we'll take another look.

Changes

We may update this policy as DCH grows. When we make a significant change, we'll update the date at the top of this page and let current customers know. Continuing to use DCH after a change means you accept the updated policy.

Questions? Email [email protected].