Bulletproof hosting
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Bulletproof hosting (sometimes known as bulk-friendly hosting) is a service provided by some domain hosting or web hosting firms that allows their customer considerable leniency in the kinds of material they may upload and distribute. This leniency has been taken advantage of by spammers [1] and providers of online gambling or pornography.[2]
Many service providers have Terms of Service that do not allow certain materials to be uploaded or distributed, or the service to be used in a particular way, and may suspend a hosting account, after a few complaints, to minimize the risk of their IP subnet being blocked by anti-spam filters using Internet Protocol (IP) based filtering. Additionally, some service providers may have ethical concerns that underpin their service terms and conditions.
Often, a bulletproof host allows a content provider to bypass the laws or contractual terms of service regulating Internet content and service use in its own country of operation, as many of these 'bulletproof hosts' are based 'overseas' (relative to the geographical location of the content provider).
Many if not most 'bulletproof hosts' are in China[1], other parts of Asia, and Russia/Russia's surrounding countries, though this is not always the case.[3]
Few examples of bulletproof hosts, eventually with their takedown time:
- Russian Business Network (or RBN), taken down on Nov 2007 [1]
- Attrivo/Intercage, taken down on Sept 2008 [2]
- McColo, taken down on Nov 2008 [3]
- 3FN, taken down by FTC on June 2009 [4]
- Real Host, taken down on August 2009 [5]
- CyberBunker
