TopDawg Host has certain legal and ethical responsibilities consisting with the use of its server and equipment involved in these services.

TopDawg Host general policy is to act as a provider of hosting. TopDawg Host reserves the right to suspend or cancel a customer's access to any or all services provided by TopDawg Host when we decide that the account has been inappropriately used.

Account Passwords
You must use a strong password for your accounts at TopDawg Host including but not limited to email, and MySQL. You are and will be held liable if your account is compromised do to your weak password strength.

When choosing a password, please use UPPERCASE, lowercase, and numbers in between the letters.
Example of a weak password: boodo
An example of a strong password: B5oO94D3o

Server Abuse

Any attempt to undermine or cause harm to a server, or customer, of TopDawg Host is strictly prohibited.

Unauthorized use of other people's accounts or computers TopDawg Host will strongly react to any use or attempted use of an hosting account or computer without the owner's authorization. Such attempts include "hosting scamming" (tricking other people into releasing their passwords), password robbery, security hole scanning etc.

Any unauthorized use of accounts or computers by a TopDawg Host customer, whether or not the attacked account or computer belongs to TopDawg Host, will result in action against the attacker. Possible actions include warnings, account suspension or cancellation, and civil or criminal legal action, depending on the seriousness of the attack.

IMPORTANT NOTE - TopDawg Host has the right to discontinue service, or deny access to anyone who violates our Policies or the terms and conditions shown below WITHOUT WARNING OR PRIOR NOTICE. No refunds of fees paid will be made if account termination is due to violation of the terms outlined below.

Customers may not run IRC, bots or clients on shared servers. Unacceptable uses also include, but are NOT limited to: Bulk emailing, unsolicited emails, newsgroup spamming, illegal content, copyright infringement, trademark infringement, warez, cracks, software serial numbers, and/or anything else determined by TopDawg Host to be unacceptable use of TopDawg Host services including abuse of server resources.

Shared hosting accounts may be terminated that include the following content or which have links to the following content: Providing material that is grossly offensive to the Web community including blatant expressions of bigotry, racism, hatred, or profanity Promoting or providing instructional information about illegal activities, or promoting physical harm or injury against any group or individual Displaying material that exploits children under 18 years of age Acts of copyright infringement including offering pirated computer programs or links to such programs, information used to circumvent manufacturer-installed copy-protect devices, including serial or registration numbers for software programs, or any type of cracker utilities

Shared Hosting Server Resource Usage
User may not:

• Use 25% or more of system resources for longer then 90 seconds. There are many activities that could cause such problems; these include but not limited to: CGI scripts, FTP, PHP, HTTP
• Run any type of interactive real-time chat applications that require server resources. Remotely-hosted services are allowed.
• Run stand-alone, unattended server-side processes at any point in time on the server. This includes any and all daemons, such as IRCD.
• Run any software that interfaces with an IRC (Internet Relay Chat) network.
• Run any bit torrent application, tracker, or client.
• Participate in any file-sharing and/or peer-to-peer activities
• Run any gaming servers such as counter-strike, half-life, battlefield1492, etc
• Run cron entries with intervals of less than 15 minutes
• Run a file serving and/or sharing site
• Use server for a file storage and/or backup storage server
  
  

Server Disk Usage

All files within your account must be directly related to your domain's web site design and/or the domain’s functionality. Your account's allocated disk space is NOT to be used as an off site computer backup and/or file storage. If you require an off site backup server, we do offer servers which are dedicated for off site backup or file storage.

TopDawg Host will be the sole arbiter as to what constitutes a violation of these provisions.

Unsolicited Email (Spam)

Unsolicited commercial advertisements (spam) are not allowed in e-mail, and will result in account cancellation.

The following activities are not allowed: Unsolicited bulk or commercial messages ("spam"). This includes, but is not limited to, bulk mailing of commercial advertising, informational announcements, charity requests, petitions for signatures, and political or religious tracts. Such messages may only be sent to those who have explicitly requested it from your domain. Forging, altering or removing electronic mail headers is prohibited. Any domain sending stealth spam will be terminated without warning and without refund. Sending numerous copies of the same or substantially similar message with the intent to disrupt a server or account ("mail bombing"). Spamming Newsgroups: Commercial advertisements are unwelcome in most Usenet discussion groups and on most e-mail mailing lists. Inappropriate posting may result in account cancellation. See the newsgroup or mailing list's charter for whether advertising is allowed or not. "Spamming," or sending a message to many different off-topic newsgroups, is particularly unethical and will be treated as such. Mail may not be used to harass or intimidate others. Harassment, whether through language, frequency of messages, or size of messages, is prohibited. Sending a single unwelcome message may be considered harassment. If a recipient asks to stop receiving e-mail, you must not send that person any further messages.

TopDawg Host takes a zero-tolerance approach to spam originating from our servers or for spam advertising of domains hosted on our servers. We will charge the compromised account the time it takes TopDawg Host to get the our servers and/or IP address or addresses removed from any banned email server because of such actions at a cost of $50.00 USD per hour.

Note: If you use the services of another provider to promote a web site hosted by or through TopDawg Host (spamvertising), then the provisions of the above Policy shall apply as if the spam were sent through our servers.

99.99% Hosting Uptime Guarantee

(1.) Coverage This 99.9% uptime guarantee applies to any TopDawg Host client in good financial standing with TopDawg Host at the time of a service outage.

(2.) Service Level Agreement & Specifications TopDawg Host endeavors to have the content of your web site available for http access by any party in the world 99.9% of the time. Network downtime (unavailability) is defined as 100% packet loss from TopDawg Host to its backbone providers. Downtime is measured past 10 minutes after notification of network failure via TopDawg Host online ticketing system. If the ticketing system itself is unreachable, the ticket must be started by calling the TopDawg Host NOC (network operation center). TopDawg Host administrators will determine the end of the downtime by a trace route to the customer's machine from outside the TopDawg Host network.

In the event that your web site is not available for more than 99.9%, TopDawg Host will credit the following month's service fee.


In order for you to receive a credit on your account, you must request such credit within seven (7) days after you experienced the down time. You must request credit by sending an electronic mail message to office@TopDawgHost.com . For security, the body of this message must contain your account number, the dates and times of the unavailability of your web site, and such other customer identification requested by TopDawg Host. Credits will usually be applied within sixty (60) days of your credit request. Credit to your account shall be your sole and exclusive remedy in the event of an outage.

Credits shall not be provided to you in the event that you have any outage resulting from

1. The time it takes to perform scheduled maintenance of the server.
2. An application or script failure of a client's which causes a machine to fail as a result of the application's or script's failure.
3. A client breaking any item in TopDawg Host "terms of conditions and acceptable use policy" causing a machine to fail as a result.
4. Circumstances beyond TopDawg Host reasonable control, including, without limitation, acts of God, acts of any governmental body, war, insurrection, sabotage, embargo, fire, server hardware failure, strike or other labor disturbance, interruption of or delay in transportation, unavailability of interruption or delay in telecommunications or third party services, including DNS propagation, domain name registration / transfer, failure of third party software or hardware or inability to obtain raw materials, supplies, or power used in or equipment needed for provision of your web site.

99.9% Server Uptime Guarantee

TopDawg Host is committed to maintaining a reliable, high-speed network with a guaranteed network uptime of 99.9%. We will credit next months fee for any excess downtime that is experienced due to circumstances within our control. This guarantee only applies to any customer who has purchased service and whose account is in good standing.

If network downtime is in excess of .1% for the month, customers may request a credit of 30 days fee for every consecutive 30 minutes the network is unavailable in excess of .1%. Total credit is not to exceed 100% of the monthly fee paid.

Exceptions: Scheduled server maintenance, emergency security maintenance, server restarts, acts of God, malicious acts to the server from any party, and server hardware upgrades.
Any network interruption beyond TopDawg Host's control.

In order to receive credit, please submit a support ticket to our billing department within 7 days of the occurrence.

Hardware Guarantee: TopDawg Host is proud to provide high quality brand name hardware including Dell servers to our dedicated server customers. In the event of a hardware failure, TopDawg Host will replace any failed component at no cost to the customer. This includes any faulty RAM, hard disk, motherboard, processor, or NIC cards.

Your Satisfaction is GUARANTEED

• The TopDawg Host Unconditional Satisfaction Guarantee which applies to all Shared Hosting and Reseller Hosting Packages.
• This only applies to the first 30 days of hosting fees paid by the client.
• The TopDawg Host Satisfaction Guarantee only applies to first time clients, if you have been a past client and have returned to TopDawg Host we can not offer you this guarantee twice.
• The TopDawg Host Satisfaction Guarantee does not apply to any Dedicated Server. All monthly and setup fees for dedicated servers are non-refundable.
• The TopDawg Host Satisfaction Guarantee starts on the date the initial order was placed and ends 30 days thereafter.

30 Day Money Back GUARANTEE

• The TopDawg Host Unconditional Money Back Guarantee which applies to all Shared Hosting and Reseller Hosting Packages.
• The Refund applies only to the first 30 days of hosting fees paid by the client.
• The TopDawg Host Money Back Guarantee only applies to first time clients, if you have been a past client and have returned to TopDawg Host we can not offer you this guarantee twice.
• The TopDawg Host Money Back Guarantee does not apply to any Dedicated Server. All monthly and setup fees for dedicated servers are non-refundable.
• The TopDawg Host Money Back Guarantee starts on the date the initial order was placed and ends 30 days thereafter.

CGI Scripts

Each shared web hosting account comes with its own cgi-bin. You are free to use any CGI scripts you wish, however we reserve the right to disable any CGI script that effects normal shared server operation without prior warning.

Chat Rooms

Most chat rooms tend to be large system hogs and we cannot allow it as an account option. However, we do provide a choice of Java chat rooms through the Fantastico within you and your clients cPanel control. Note: Parachat chat rooms do not apply to this rule. They are perfectly fine to install.

Abuse of SMTP Mail Server

We do not allow clients to send more than 2000 pieces of e-mail per day from a shared hosting account. If you do send more than 2000 pieces of e-mail per day, your account will be placed on hold for Network Abuse. If you are sending legitimate e-mails and they total more than 2000 per day your account will be moved to a special server that is specifically designed to handle high volumes of e-mail. You will be charged $50.00/month in addition to your regular hosting charges if your account is moved to this server. Please contact our support department to request your domain be moved.

Background Running Programs

We may allow programs to run continually in the background. These are considered on a one-to-one basis and an extra charge will be incurred based on system resources used and operational maintenance needed.

IRC

We do not allow IRC or IRC bots to be operated on our servers. Anyone found to be running them will be in violation of this agreement.

Payment Policies

All accounts are set up on a pre-pay basis. Setup fees are charged for all new accounts and major account changes and are non-refundable. All pricing is guaranteed for the term of pre-payment. TopDawg Host reserves the right to change prices at any time, unless other terms have been agreed upon. Any account not brought current within a week (3 days) of e-mail notice or exceeding this time frame in any way is subject to a $50 late charge and will be under suspension until the account is back in good standing which includes any money owed for webmaster work and/or designs. After 5 days the account will be removed from our servers. This also includes money which may be owed for webmaster work and/or designs. The customer is responsible for all money owed on the account from the time it was established to the time that the customer notifies TopDawg Host at cancel@TopDawgHost.com to request for termination of services. All payment is in U.S. currency. TopDawg Host will bill each client $50 per returned check, per wire transfer received and per credit card charge back received. All TopDawg Host accounts are setup on anniversary billing cycles. Your particular billing cycle corresponds to the contract length that was initially chosen at setup. Your account will automatically re-new at this length. There is no fee to change to a shorter billing cycle at the end of the current cycle. However, if you wish to change to a shorter billing cycle, during a current cycle, there will be a $50.00 fee. Please contact the billing department at billing@TopDawgHost.com should you wish to change your anniversary billing cycle.

Cancellation

TopDawg Host reserves the right to cancel service at any time. All fees paid in advance of cancellation will be forfeited if TopDawg Host institutes it's right of cancellation. Any violation of policies which results in extra costs will be billed to the customer (i.e. transfer, space, spam policy etc).  All accounts must be paid in full by the 5th day being your hosting account and/or web design account or your account will be suspended.  By the 7th day of past due your account will be removed from our servers.

All of TopDawg Host web hosting plans are backed by a 30 day money back guarantee. If you are not completely satisfied with our services or support within the first 30 days of your contract, you will be given a full refund of the contract amount excluding setup fees, domain registration fees, add-on/upgrade fees and overages. Setup fees are refundable only if the account order is canceled prior to account activation. For all web hosting clients who cancel, the full contract amount less any setup fees and overages will be refunded if TopDawg Host is notified within the first 30 days following activation. No refund is available after the 30th day. This policy does not apply to any additional services such as overages, referrer logs, real audio/video, additional disk space, additional pop accounts, domain registration fees etc. Due to security concerns, all account cancellations must be done via our cancellation forms at cancel@TopDawgHost.com . Phone or email requests will not constitute a acceptance of any cancellation. Refunds will be made by company check or issued back to your credit card within 30 days of receipt of cancellation.

Intellectual Property Rights

Material accessible to you through TopDawg Host services may be subject to protection under the United States or other copyright laws, or laws protecting trademarks, trade secrets or proprietary information. Except when expressly permitted by the owner of such rights, you must not use TopDawg Host or its servers and network in a manner that would infringe, violate, dilute or misappropriate any such rights, with respect to any material, which you access or receive through the TopDawg Host network. If you use a domain name in connection with TopDawg Host or similar service, you must not use that domain name in violation of any trademark, service mark, or similar rights of any third party.

Network Security

Customers may not use the TopDawg Host network with an attempt to circumvent user authentication or security of any host, network, or account. This includes, but is not limited to, accessing data not intended for the customer, logging into a server or account the customer is not expressly authorized to access, password cracking, probing the security of other networks in search of weakness, or violation of any other organization's security policy. Customers may not attempt to interfere or deny service to any user, host, or network. This includes, but is not limited to, flooding, mail bombing, or other deliberate attempts to overload or crash a host or network. TopDawg Host will cooperate fully with investigations of violations of systems or network security at other sites, including cooperating with law enforcement authorities in the investigation of suspected criminal violations. Users who violate system or network security may incur criminal or civil liability.

Electronic Commerce

You will be solely responsible for the development, operation and maintenance of your online store and products and all contents and materials appearing online or on your products, including without limitation

• the accuracy and appropriateness of content and materials appearing within the store or related to your products
• ensuring that the content and materials appearing within the store or related to your products do not violate or infringe upon the rights of any third party
• ensuring that the content and materials appearing within the store or related to your products are not libelous or otherwise illegal. You will be solely responsible for the final calculation and application of shipping and sales tax. You will also be solely responsible for accepting, processing, and filling any customer orders, and for handling any customer inquiries or complaints arising there from.
  
  

You are also responsible for the security of any customer credit card numbers and related customer information you may access as a result of conducting electronic commerce transactions through your Web Site. You will keep all such information confidential and will use the same degree of care and security as you use with your confidential information.

Static / Dynamic Content Caching

You expressly (i) grant to TopDawg Host a license to cache the entirety of your Web Site, including content supplied by third parties, hosted by TopDawg Host under this Agreement and (ii) agree that such caching is not an infringement of any of your intellectual property rights or any third party's intellectual property rights.

Adult Content Domains/Sites

All adult content sites within the TopDawg Host servers shall be in FULL compliant with US CODE: Title 18,2257. Record keeping requirements. 
Adult content sites MAY NOT contain:

• Any type of violent acts such as but not limited to: BDSM, Rape, and/or any other violent acts.
• Any acts of humiliation towards a woman and/or man
• Any religion and or religious depictions
• Grotesque acts such as but not limited to: bestiality, scat, blood, urine

At anytime a domain/site is suspect of violating this agreement, the domain/site will be suspended until a complete investigation can be completed. TopDawg Host and/or it's employees shall be given access to all areas of the domain/site to conducts said investigation. If at anytime during said investigation content is deleted from the domain/site, the deleted files will be recovered and the account will be terminated. If at anytime the content is found illegal, ANY AND ALL privacy rights are void and all content and customer information data will be forwarded to the proper authorities.
We will cooperate fully with law enforcement agencies.
TopDawg Host will be the sole arbiter as to what constitutes a violation of these provisions.

IP Address Ownership

TopDawg Host shall maintain and control ownership of all IP numbers and addresses that may be assigned to you by TopDawg Host and TopDawg Host reserves, in its sole discretion, to change or remove any and all such IP numbers and addresses.

Torturous Conduct

Any abuse of our staff in any medium or format will result in the suspension and/or termination of your services without notice and/or refunds of any kind. We are the sole arbiter in determining what is considered abuse to our staff.

Any case of indecent treatment towards a TopDawg Host employee will be considered inappropriate. Each Customer should avoid applying any forms of verbal, and/or written emotional outburst including cursing of any type.

Any forms of verbal, and/or written emotional outburst including cursing of any type which also includes attempts of deliberately undermining behavior will be interpreted as a breach of this TOS (terms of Service) and customer's account will be suspended and removed without warning and/or chance of backup.  Furthermore, no refunds for any payments in advance will be issued because of the customer's breach of this TOS (terms of Service) agreement.

Other acts of indecent treatment towards TopDawg Host employees that will be considered as unacceptable including any verbal, written or delivered by a second party addressing TopDawg Host or any of its employees, partners, equipment, and concerns. Any forms of such indecent treatment will be interpreted as a breach of this TOS (terms of Service). TopDawg Host  holds the right to assess which behavior will be treated as a breach of this TOS (terms of Service) by the client and/or any second party addressing TopDawg Host  on the client's behalf and furthermore no refunds to the clients whose accounts have been suspended for violating the TOS (terms of Service).

Lawful Purpose

TopDawg Host reserves the right to refuse service to anyone. Customers may only use TopDawg Host server for lawful purpose. Transmission of any material in violation of any Federal, State or Local regulation is prohibited. This includes, but is not limited to copyrighted material, material legally judged to be threatening or obscene, and material protected by trade secrets. The designation of any materials as such described above is left entirely to the discretion of TopDawg Host management. Regardless of the place of signing this agreement, the client agrees that for purposes of venue this contract was entered into in Wake County, Raleigh, NC, and any dispute will be litigated or arbitrated in Wake County, NC. Defendants further waive all objections to venue and acknowledge that venue in any such litigation will be held in Wake County courts. IN NO EVENT SHALL TopDawg Host MAXIMUM LIABILITY EXCEED ONE HUNDRED ($100.00) DOLLARS.

Disclosure to law enforcement
TopDawg Host may disclose any subscriber's information to law enforcement agencies without further consent or notification to the subscriber only upon lawful request from such agencies.
We will cooperate fully with law enforcement agencies.

Indemnification

CUSTOMER AGREES THAT IT SHALL DEFEND, INDEMNIFY, SAVE AND HOLD TopDawg Host HARMLESS FROM ANY AND ALL DEMANDS, LIABILITIES, LOSSES, COSTS AND CLAIMS, INCLUDING REASONABLE ATTORNEY'S FEES ASSERTED AGAINST TopDawg Host, ITS AGENTS, ITS CUSTOMERS, OFFICERS AND EMPLOYEES, THAT MAY ARISE OR RESULT FROM ANY SERVICE PROVIDED OR PERFORMED OR AGREED TO BE PERFORMED OR ANY PRODUCT SOLD BY CUSTOMER, IT'S AGENTS, EMPLOYEES OR ASSIGNS. CUSTOMER AGREES TO DEFEND, INDEMNIFY AND HOLD HARMLESS TopDawg Host AGAINST LIABILITIES ARISING OUT OF;

• ANY INJURY TO PERSON OR PROPERTY CAUSED BY ANY PRODUCTS SOLD OR OTHERWISE DISTRIBUTED IN CONNECTION WITH TopDawg Host SERVER
• ANY MATERIAL SUPPLIED BY CUSTOMER INFRINGING OR ALLEGEDLY INFRINGING ON THE PROPRIETARY RIGHTS OF A THIRD PARTY
• COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT
• ANY DEFECTIVE PRODUCTS SOLD TO CUSTOMER FROM TopDawg Host SERVER.

Disclaimer

TopDawg Host WILL NOT BE RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGES YOUR BUSINESS MAY SUFFER. TopDawg Host MAKES NO WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED FOR SERVICES WE PROVIDE. TopDawg Host DISCLAIMS ANY WARRANTY OR MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. THIS INCLUDES LOSS OF DATA RESULTING FROM ACTS OF GOD, DELAYS, NON-DELIVERIES, WRONG DELIVERY, ANY AND ALL SERVICE INTERRUPTIONS CAUSED BY TopDawg Host AND ITS EMPLOYEES. TopDawg Host RESERVES THE RIGHT TO REVISE ITS POLICIES AT ANY TIME. ALL SUB-NETWORKS, RESELLERS OF TopDawg Host MUST ADHERE TO THE ABOVE POLICIES. FAILURE TO FOLLOW ANY TERM OR CONDITION WILL BE GROUNDS FOR IMMEDIATE ACCOUNT DEACTIVATION AND POSSIBLE FURTHER CHARGES DUE.

Backups and Data Loss
Your use of our hosting service is at your sole risk. TopDawg Host is not responsible for files and/or data residing on your account. You agree to take full responsibility for files and data transferred and also to maintain all appropriate backup of files and data stored on TopDawg Host's servers. You also agree not to keep said backups within the TopDawg Host servers in case of server drive failure.

Changes to the TOS
TopDawg Host reserves the right to revise its policies at any time without notice.

Cancel Rights
TopDawg Host reserves the right to cancel the account and remove the client's file system at any time with or without notice.

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