Suspended account for 'scrapping, black seo'. I do

Hi,
I just got e-mail from Terri H that it has been suspended and will not get reinstated. I have no idea what went wrong and Im not getting any info from DH support.

"Your account will not be reinstated under any circumstances. You must find hosting elsewhere.

Terri H
"
Can someone help me with this?

Be glad to:
http://www.google.com/search?rls=en-us&q=web+hosting&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8



-Scott

Scott shouldn't that be

web hosting -dreamhost ?




openvein.org -//-

I'd be curious to see an official response to this, as I'm not sure it's a good idea to just auto assume that this fellow has done something "bad" himself. Judging from his WHT thread it's a matter of spammers abusing a vulnerable script maybe? I wouldn't think *that* (if that *is* the case) to be worthy of a banishment / communications blackout... I'm really hoping that there's more to it than the former customer is saying.

do DH people post here? I would like to resolve this asap. I don't know anything about black seo or scraping.

In reply to:

---

do DH people post here? I would like to resolve this asap. I don't know anything about black seo or scraping.

---

DreamHost staff do visit sometimes, but its not guaranteed they will help you through the forum. Especially if you don't post your domain or something else they can identify you by.

Scraping can be confused with including RSS feeds. Feed providers may not allow you to embed feeds into your own web site, or if one visits their site, and then visits yours, they may think you illicitly copied content from provider. So if you did use feeds, you want to point out that the provider gives permission to include the content, like in a Terms of Service page, and/or credit the provider on your pages too.

As for black hat seo, it is defined as "spamdexing, attempt to redirect search results to particular target pages in a fashion that is against the search engines' terms of service" Now most of the time this applies to those web sites that include nothing but pages of links where the text is just keywords, but this can include other tactics, as well as someone exploiting a vulnerability with your web site and hiding these spam links in your pages. Also be weary of any plugins/applications that you use that perform "seo" or "search engine optimization".


openvein.org -//-

Post a link to your other threads. rlparker might be able to step in here.




How To Install PHP.INI / ionCube on DreamHost

I assume then from this thread that there are no warnings at DH? Great...

That's not to say I endorse any such tactics myself, I might add. You might have got away with it ten years ago, but now we have Google.

Is this behaviour considered unsavoury on only shared ips or does it also apply to ps, unique ips etc. as well?

Finally, can someone supply a link to the rule book, thanks

ItchySoxEdited by ItchySox on 02/10/09 01:59 AM (server time).

Well, the official response was what was communicated to the user in the support communication he/she received from DreamHost staff.

The poster here has given no information sufficient to allow me, or another staffer, to even identify the account, so until that happens I'll have nothing to say on the matter.

--rlparker
--DreamHost Tech Support

In reply to:

---

I'd be curious to see an official response to this, as I'm not sure it's a good idea to just auto assume that this fellow has done something "bad" himself. Judging from his WHT thread it's a matter of spammers abusing a vulnerable script maybe? I wouldn't think *that* (if that *is* the case) to be worthy of a banishment / communications blackout... I'm really hoping that there's more to it than the former customer is saying.

---

I hope there's more to it as well

Was the script's name mentioned? Got a link to that WHT thread?

I don't have anything critical here at DH, but I'd hate to lose the entire shooting match with no recourse because a seldom-used Gallery installation or something was hijacked by spammers.




How To Install PHP.INI / ionCube on DreamHost

Hi,
my account info:

#141950 "rscmedia's Account" (disabled)

Please elt me know what happened there. As you can see I have multiple domains there and few blogs that might use RSS features but thats about it. I don't know anything about spamdexing or black seo. If there are please let me know.

http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?s=c55b64e4f0c325d3910abd24ae0ad29f&t=756604

thats me on WHT. Now all 3 of my tickets have been closed. DH support is silent.

I have discussed the matter with our administrators, and our Abuse and Security staff, and I see that each of them has responded to you today with additional detail. I have nothing to add to what they have already told you, and won't discuss it further with you here.

--rlparker
--DreamHost Tech Support

Would you be able to offer some assurance for the rest of us? I'm just wanting to feel comfortable that this was a properly investigated and handled instance of legitly "shady" stuff.

I would also like an explanation of what happened...Sometimes, based on posts of "I got banned", I get the feeling that "Arvid" is perusing domains and looking for something...-anything- so he can press the 'kill' button!

Black hat seo stuff is like hiding text in the background--font size 1, same as BG color, using keywords a little too much on a site, etc. Google will ban you for all those tricks anyway... I don't see how a webhost can be the judge and jury in this matter.
And scraping (where you act like a search-engine bot going thru an entire site)...was he the 'scraper' or the 'scrapee'? If you are the scraper, you would usually run that from your own computer--but if this person was using a shared server to do this...then I would have to agree that is not right. If he was the 'scrapee', then I don't see how it was his fault...maybe offer to modify the robots or htaccess file.

I think this thread is showing there are a lot of people worried that a simple mistake can get them banned permanently by an overzealous tech... with almost no details! If it's something that is affecting the performance of the shared server, then by all means...but maybe issue a warning or a temp suspension first? I don't see what could be so bad as to warrant the kind of action we have seen against this '90210' user. (If it was directories full of movie dvd isos, commercial software/music... then yeah, boot them!)
Another thing I wonder is if I have domains registered thru dreamhost and my site or account gets disabled, do I lose the rights to my domain-name as well??

At best, I suspect it was excessive ignorance that got this user thrown out. As it seems that many on the DreamHost staff have looked at this case, I'm betting it was a sound decision.

As for domain registrations, you'll never lose that due to breaking ToS. It's just best if you transfer the domain to another registrar.

-Scott

I would bet that you're right, but it *is* rather frightening to imagine being locked and blacked out without proper care being given in the judgement.

The thought did hit me though that Mr. Parker is a trustworthy feller enough that if something would have been *wrong* with the decision he would have made things right. I know for a personal fact that he's willing to go through more for a customer than would normally be called for, so I have found my peace of mind!

To the contrary, I find rl's OOC response all the more troubling




How To Install PHP.INI / ionCube on DreamHost

Why so? And why do you consider it to be OOC? I've had a good many personal interactions with him over the last few years, and he's really went above and beyond for me recently, so I can't really see him *not* going to bat for this guy if something would have not been right when he looked into it.

Yeah I love Robert too, he's a top bloke

We know rl to be intelligent of mind, fair in judgement, and hardly one to be lost for words when issuing responses, especially so when a thread has multiple participants actively seeking clarification on a point. His proven dedication to help others approaches the Saint level. Thus I find a basically zero-info reply quite OOC. It was disconcerting to me for precisely the reasons you mention in your closing sentence.

OP's insistance that he has done nothing wrong has not been rebutted here and I think some official "assurance" (as you immediately requested yourself) would be placating for others reading this thread. Even if it's along the line of "The scraping didn't pertain to Feeds", or "Abuse aren't claiming Blogger Tags are BHSEO".

If OP was intentionally noise > signal then begone with him, I just want the lowdown.




How To Install PHP.INI / ionCube on DreamHost

At some point, you've got to stop making public what's essentially a private issue between the customer and the business. While the customer has the right to divulge whatever information they like, the business can not. rl's response says to me that DH has made a thorough investigation and informed its customer.

-Scott

Granted. But this is actually the first time since I've been here that DH hasn't rebutted a false claim of "I didn't!" from a recently kicked OP, and silence does tend to leave a "what if...?" or two hanging in the air.




How To Install PHP.INI / ionCube on DreamHost

This wasn't a claim of "I didn't." It's more of a claim of "I don't understand what that means." Which is why I said it could be excessive ignorance.

On that note, it'd be nice to hear why rlparker didn't elaborate. I'd most like to hear if a) the user was warned, or b) it was so egregious that it warranted an immediate boot.

-Scott