Privacy Policy

ACCEPTABLE USE POLICY

This Acceptable Use Policy forms part of the General Terms and Conditions applicable to all Clients. This Acceptable Use Policy applies to all services or facilities supplied by the Provider.

This document has been written to state the Acceptable Use Policy while explaining the issues and concepts to which it refers.

To use the Provider’s products and services, Clients must comply with the provisions of this Acceptable Use Policy at all times and in particular must not perform or undertake any action which is considered Unacceptable Use of the products provided to them by the Provider. For clarity within this guide, the following terms are defined:

‘Account’ means a single billing entity, comprising all services being supplied by the Provider to the Client. This may range from a single dial-up account through to a complete package of services and facilities;
‘AUP’ means this Acceptable Use Policy;
‘the Services’ means the general name used to refer to the service offering provided by the Provider;
‘Publishing Facility’ means a facility provided by the Provider to enable the Client to publish information and data on the Internet. Examples include: web space; file transfer facilities; email mailing lists; database provision; intercommunications facilities such as guest-books, registers and chat facilities;
‘Unacceptable Use’ means an action that is in breach of this AUP.

This AUP has the following aims:

• To ensure the security, reliability and integrity of the Provider’s systems and network, the systems and networks of the Provider’s Clients and the networks and systems of others.
• To maintain the image and reputation of the Provider as a responsible Internet Service Provider.
• To encourage the responsible use of net resources, discouraging practices which degrade the usability of network resources and thus the value of Internet services.
• To preserve the privacy and security of individual Internet users.

Unacceptable Use is an abuse of Internet facilities and services and not necessarily abuse on the Internet. Any of the following qualify as Unacceptable Use:

• Interfering with the Internet use of an individual or group; or
• An action intended to violate the privacy or infringe the intellectual property rights of others; or
• Activities that are illegal or dishonest; or
• Activities which cause any individual annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety; or
• Any activity which contravenes the acceptable use policies of any connected networks, including the Internet.

The following are some specific examples of Unacceptable Use:

• Chain Letters and Pyramid-selling Schemes.  The most common example of this in email is “Make Money Fast”.
• Unsolicited Commercial Email.  Unsolicited Commercial Email is advertising material received by email without the recipient either requesting such information or otherwise expressing an interest in the material advertised. It should be noted that an individual who has posted information on the Internet on a particular subject has not made a specific request for information to be emailed to them.
• Unsolicited Bulk Email (UBE).  Similar to the above UCE but not attempting to sell anything.
• Open Relay.  You must not run an “open relay”. This is a machine which accepts mail from unknown or unauthorised senders and forwards it to a destination outside of your network.
• Mail Bombing.  Mail bombing is the sending of multiple emails, or one large email, with the intent of annoying a fellow Internet user or affecting their use of the Internet.
• Mailing List Subscriptions.  You must not subscribe anyone to a mail list or similar service without their permission.
• Forged Headers and/or Addresses.  Forging headers or messages means sending data (including email) such that its origin appears to be another user or machine, or a non-existent machine. It is also forgery to arrange for any replies to mail to be sent to some other user or machine.
• Denial of Service.  Denial of Service is any activity designed to prevent a specific host or user on the Internet making full and effective use of their facilities. This includes, but is not limited to: mail bombing, opening an excessive number of connections to the same host, intentionally sending data designed to damage the receiver’s systems when interpreted.
• Illegal Content.  You must not use the service provided by the Provider to send or receive across the Internet, or use a Publishing Facility to publish any material which violates any law, treaty, regulation or lawful order. This includes but is not limited to material that is prohibited under the various acts of parliament dealing with material sent over a public telecommunications network.
• Objectionable Content.   You must not use the service provided by the Provider to publish, send or receive any material which the Provider concludes, in the Provider’s sole discretion, is objectionable and with which the Provider does not want to be associated, in order to protect the Provider’s reputation and brand image, or to protect the Provider’s employees and affiliates. Objectionable content includes, but is not limited to, any material which:
  
  
  • is obscene, abusive, menacing, offensive, racist or defamatory; or
  • contains fraudulent, deceptive , threatening, intimidating or harassing statements; or
  • violates the privacy rights of any individual.
• Indecent Content.  Is that which depicts sexual or excretory activities in a patently offensive manner as measured by contemporary community standards.
• Contents of Websites or Web Pages.  Your web site or personal web page(s) content must not include:
  
  
  • materials which depict or describe scantily-clad and lewdly depicted male and/or female forms or body parts, and which lack serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value; or
  • materials which suggest or depict obscene, indecent, vulgar, lewd or erotic behaviour, and which lack serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value; or
  • materials which hold the Provider or the Provider’s partners, affiliates, employees or shareholders up to public scorn or ridicule; or
  • materials which encourage the commission of a crime, or which tend to incite violence, or which tend to degrade any person or group based on sex, nationality, religion, colour, age, marital status, sexual orientation, disability or political affiliation.
• Breach of Intellectual Property Rights.  You must not transmit or publish any material which infringes the intellectual property rights of any third party (for example, copyright or trade mark rights), unless you have permission to do from the owner of such intellectual property.
• Publishing Requirements.  You must ensure that any Publishing Facility that you utilise through the Provider provides a clear warning before allowing access to any potentially offensive material.
• Causing Unacceptable Use.  You may not advertise your information or data residing on any Publishing Facility, or cause another person to advertise it, by techniques that would be classified as abuse if they were carried out from an account provided by the Provider. This includes, but is not limited to, bulk emailing and excessive news posting.
• Unauthorised Access (“Hacking”, “Cracking”).  You must not attempt to gain unauthorised access to any host, network, data, or account.
• Responsible Use.  You must act as a responsible Internet citizen at all times and follow all Internet usage guidelines that are generally accepted by the Internet community.

The above are more easily defined examples of Unacceptable Use.

Unacceptable Use of the Services is not limited to the above, but may include any activity reported to the Provider, which is considered, in its sole opinion, to be a serious abuse of the products or Services provided by the Provider.

The Provider will not routinely monitor the contents of the Client’s web sites or pages. However, the Provider will investigate to the extent that it, in its sole discretion, deems appropriate, suspected or alleged breaches of this AUP.

If the Provider determines, in its sole discretion, that the Client has breached the provisions of this AUP then the Provider will take such action as it, in its sole discretion, deems appropriate. Such action may include, without limitation, one or more of the following:

• a formal or informal warning;
• the removal of material which is the subject of the breach from any web site or web page, or the removal of any web page(s) hosted on the Provider’s servers;
• making an additional charge for the Provider’s reasonable costs of investigating and dealing with the matter;
• suspending or terminating all or any products or services provided to the Client.
• the Provider shall not be liable for any loss of business, data, revenue or profits or any direct or consequential or indirect loss which may occur as a result of taking such action in response to a breach of this AUP by the Client, except that nothing in this AUP shall exclude or restrict the Provider’s liability for death or personal injury resulting from its negligence or that of its employees while acting in the course of their employment.

In the process of identifying a suspected or alleged breach of this AUP, the Provider may need to liaise closely with other external bodies, in order to fully identify the breach. If in the sole opinion of the Provider it is deemed necessary the Provider reserves the right to identify You to other third parties. the Provider may suspend the service provided to the Client whilst investigating any such suspected or alleged breach of this AUP.

A breach of any provision of this AUP shall also constitute a breach of the Provider’s General Terms and Conditions.

The internet is a rapidly evolving network. New facilities, practices and developments are being agreed all the time. It is critical therefore that this AUP be amended from time to time to reflect these changes. The Provider reserves the right to revise this AUP at any time at its sole discretion, and your use of the services provided to you by the Provider will constitute your acceptance of such revised terms.

It is Your responsibility to check this from time to time as any changes are immediately applicable to all customers.