Acceptable Use Policy

1. Scope

This AUP applies to all services provided by 8th Layer Solutions, including shared web hosting, cloud application hosting, email features, domain and DNS services, storage, network access, customer portals, APIs, and related support services.

Prohibited activity is not permitted whether it is attempted, successful, performed directly, performed through a third party, or knowingly enabled by a customer.

2. Lawful Use

You may use the services only for lawful purposes and in compliance with applicable laws, regulations, court orders, and the rights of others. You may not use the services to facilitate, promote, advertise, distribute, or conceal unlawful activity.

Prohibited uses include, without limitation:

• Fraud, scams, impersonation, deceptive schemes, or theft;
• Unauthorized access to computers, accounts, networks, data, or services;
• Sale or distribution of illegal goods, services, controlled substances, or unlawfully obtained information;
• Human trafficking, exploitation, or activity that endangers any person;
• Violation of export controls, sanctions, or other trade restrictions; and
• Using the services to evade law enforcement, legal process, or another provider's lawful restrictions.

3. Security and Network Abuse

You may not use or allow the services to:

• Probe, scan, test, access, or monitor a system or network without authorization;
• Conduct or facilitate denial-of-service attacks, traffic flooding, amplification, reflection, or resource-exhaustion attacks;
• Intercept, alter, spoof, forge, or redirect traffic, headers, identities, or communications without authorization;
• Defeat authentication, access controls, rate limits, security controls, or usage restrictions;
• Operate botnets, command-and-control infrastructure, credential-stuffing systems, or automated account-abuse tools;
• Distribute credentials, access tokens, private keys, stolen data, or instructions primarily intended to enable unauthorized access; or
• Interfere with the availability, integrity, or security of our services or any third-party system.

Legitimate security research or testing requires prior written authorization from the owner of every affected system and must not create risk to our infrastructure or other customers.

4. Malware and Harmful Software

Hosting, transmitting, deploying, or facilitating malware is prohibited. This includes ransomware, viruses, worms, trojans, spyware, credential stealers, cryptojacking code, malicious redirects, exploit kits, and software intended to damage, disrupt, surveil, or gain unauthorized access to a device, account, or network.

Files used for legitimate malware analysis, education, or defensive research may be permitted only with our prior written approval and appropriate containment.

5. Email, Spam, and Messaging

You may not use the services to send or support:

• Unsolicited bulk email, spam, mail bombing, or abusive messaging;
• Commercial messages that do not comply with applicable consent, identification, and opt-out requirements;
• Messages using purchased, harvested, scraped, or improperly obtained recipient lists;
• Phishing, spoofing, deceptive sender information, misleading subject lines, or impersonation;
• Messages sent through open relays, open proxies, compromised accounts, or compromised devices; or
• Activity likely to place our IP addresses, domains, or network on blocklists or damage sending reputation.

You must honor valid unsubscribe requests, maintain appropriate consent records, secure forms and mailing applications, and follow any sending or relay limits associated with your plan.

6. Prohibited Content

You may not use the services to host, publish, transmit, or link to content that:

• Contains or facilitates child sexual abuse material, sexual exploitation of minors, grooming, or trafficking;
• Makes credible threats, incites violence, facilitates targeted harassment, or unlawfully exposes private personal information;
• Is defamatory, fraudulent, unlawfully obscene, or otherwise illegal;
• Promotes terrorism or violent criminal activity in violation of applicable law;
• Provides instructions or services primarily designed to enable fraud, theft, unauthorized access, or physical harm; or
• Violates another person's privacy, publicity, contractual, or other legal rights.

7. Intellectual Property

You may not use the services to infringe or misappropriate copyrights, trademarks, patents, trade secrets, or other intellectual-property rights. This includes unauthorized distribution of copyrighted software, media, subscription content, counterfeit goods, license keys, or circumvention tools.

We may remove or disable access to allegedly infringing material and may suspend or terminate repeat infringers where appropriate. Rights holders should provide enough information for us to identify the material, the protected work, and the basis of the complaint.

8. Resource and Platform Abuse

You must use resources within the limits and intended purpose of your plan. You may not engage in activity that unreasonably consumes or degrades CPU, memory, storage, bandwidth, databases, processes, email queues, or other shared resources.

Unless we expressly approve it in writing, you may not operate:

• Cryptocurrency mining, proof-of-work, or similar compute-intensive workloads;
• Open proxies, public VPN endpoints, open DNS resolvers, Tor exit nodes, or traffic-relay services;
• Public file mirrors, seedboxes, peer-to-peer file-sharing nodes, or bulk backup repositories on plans not designed for them;
• Continuous crawlers, scrapers, automation, or AI workloads that exceed plan limits or ignore third-party restrictions;
• Resold or shared access beyond what your plan permits; or
• Any process intended to evade quotas, metering, billing, suspensions, or technical limits.

We may throttle, isolate, or require an upgrade or configuration change when usage materially affects platform stability or other customers.

9. Domains and DNS

Domains and DNS services may not be used for phishing, malware delivery, botnet control, deceptive impersonation, spam, fast-flux hosting, domain generation schemes, or other abusive or unlawful activity. You must provide accurate registration and account information and comply with applicable registry, registrar, and ICANN requirements.

A domain may be suspended, locked, redirected, or otherwise restricted when required by a registrar, registry, ICANN policy, court order, law, or urgent security need. Third-party domain actions may be outside our control.

10. Customer Responsibilities

Customers must:

• Maintain accurate account and contact information;
• Protect passwords, API keys, and other credentials and use available security controls;
• Keep customer-managed software, plugins, themes, and applications supported, patched, and securely configured;
• Monitor their services and promptly stop or remediate abusive activity;
• Maintain appropriate backups and incident-response procedures; and
• Ensure that authorized users, customers, and third parties using their services comply with this AUP.

A compromised account or application does not excuse a violation. Notify us promptly if you discover a security incident or unauthorized use involving our services.

11. Investigation and Cooperation

We may investigate suspected violations using account, network, system, abuse, and support records. You agree to provide timely and reasonable cooperation, including relevant information and remediation steps. We may preserve or disclose information when required by law, legal process, or reasonably necessary to protect rights, safety, services, customers, or the public.

We are not obligated to monitor all content or activity, and our failure to act on one violation does not waive our right to act on that or another violation later.

12. Enforcement

We determine in our reasonable discretion whether use violates this AUP. Depending on severity, history, risk, and legal requirements, we may:

• Issue a warning or request information or remediation;
• Remove or disable access to content;
• Throttle, filter, isolate, or restrict a service;
• Suspend or terminate an account or affected service;
• Charge reasonable administrative, cleanup, or abuse-related costs where permitted by our agreements and applicable law; or
• Report activity to upstream providers, rights holders, regulators, registries, or law enforcement as appropriate.

When practical, we will provide notice and an opportunity to correct a violation. We may act without advance notice when necessary to address illegal activity, a security incident, a credible threat, ongoing harm, infrastructure risk, or a legal or upstream-provider requirement.

Suspension or termination for an AUP violation does not relieve you of accrued charges and does not create a right to a refund or service credit except where required by law or expressly stated in another written agreement.

13. Reporting Abuse

Report suspected abuse involving our services to abuse@8thlayer.org. Include the affected domain, IP address, URL, relevant timestamps and time zone, a description of the issue, and supporting evidence such as message headers, logs, or screenshots. Do not send passwords, payment-card information, private keys, or unnecessary sensitive personal information.

Submitting a report does not guarantee a particular outcome. We may request additional information and may be unable to disclose investigative or customer details.

14. Changes to This Policy

We may update this AUP to reflect changes in our services, threats, industry practices, or legal obligations. The revised version will be posted with a new effective date. Material changes apply as described in our Terms of Service, except that changes reasonably necessary to address abuse, security, or legal risk may take effect immediately.

15. Contact Us