Anti-Spam Policy

What we mean by spam

Spam is any bulk or commercial message sent to people who have not agreed to receive it. This includes email, and also messages, comments and form submissions sent from our servers to other websites.

What is not allowed

• Sending unsolicited bulk or commercial email
• Using purchased, rented or harvested email lists
• Forging or hiding who sent a message, or using misleading subject lines
• Running open mail relays or open proxies
• Hosting a website that is advertised by spam, wherever the spam was sent from
• Spreading mail across many domains or IP addresses to get around spam filters
• Sending email that has no working way to unsubscribe

Rules for mailing lists

• Only send to people who asked to receive your emails. We recommend confirmed opt-in, where people confirm their address before you add them.
• Keep a record of when and how each person agreed.
• Show clearly who the email is from, and include a postal address where the law requires it.
• Include a working unsubscribe link and remove people promptly, within 10 days at the latest.
• Remove addresses that bounce, and keep your complaint rate low.

Sending limits

• Our hosting plans have an hourly limit on outgoing email. This protects the reputation of the server for every customer. For newsletters and other bulk mail, use a dedicated email marketing service.
• On VPS, outgoing email on port 25 may be restricted on new services. To request access, open a ticket and describe how you will send email.

Hacked sites and scripts

Spam is often sent by a hacked contact form or website script without the owner knowing. Keep your website software and plugins up to date, and protect your forms with a bot check. If spam comes from your account, you are responsible for fixing the cause.

What happens if spam is sent

• We may limit or stop email from the account while the cause is fixed.
• We may suspend the service and ask you to clean it up.
• We may terminate the service for repeated or deliberate spam, without a refund.
• You may be responsible for the reasonable cost of getting our servers removed from blocklists because of your mail.

Reporting spam

Send spam reports to abuse@hostelevate.com with the full message headers attached. See our Abuse Handling Policy for how we handle reports.

Laws

You must follow the anti-spam and privacy laws that apply to you and to the people you email, such as the CAN-SPAM Act in the United States, the GDPR and ePrivacy rules in Europe and Canada's anti-spam law.