Sending this out, as I suspect I am not the only person running a node on SiteValley, as they have pretty good bandwidth for pretty cheap.
I had inquired in the beginning if they allowed Tor, and they said yes, but if we get too many abuse complaints we'll shut it down. So maybe 4 or 5 abuse complaints later they did indeed give me the ultimatum to shut it down or get shut down. So I made them give me a new IP address, and made it into a middle node. (The new IP was because I was thinking of making it a bridge.)
Well this morning they told me TOR (their caps, not mine ;) is not allowed at all. I argued with them a little bit, and TLDR you might be able to get a partial refund. I'd much rather have had the bandwidth though. I'm not in a position to run high-maintence nodes, so this being a pretty fast, maintenance-once-every-three-months dedicated-to-Tor node - I was pretty happy with it.
Our conversation:
----------------- Your VPS X.Y.Z.W has been suspended due to running tor anonymyzer which is forbidden according to our Acceptable Use Policy, paragraph 8 "Prohibited Activities" http://www.sitevalley.com/acceptable-use-policy/.
In order to have your VPS unsuspended you need to agree to remove tor from it within 24 hours after the unsuspension. Failure to abide by this provision may result in termination of your account.
We have to warn you that on receiving next abuse your VPS will be terminated without without prior notice. ----------------- If you refer to Contact Form ID #YXX-XXXXyou'll see that I confirmed with you before I purchased the VPS that allowing Tor was acceptable. I dealt with the 3 or 4 abuse complaints you sent me promptly, and in #FSA-XXXXI agreed to stop using the server as a Tor Exit Node, despite our previous conversation.
The machine in question is running Tor in a non-Exit mode. Traffic from it does not appear to originate from the server, and it merely passes traffic within the Tor network. It cannot generate abuse complaints from third parties when running in this mode. Have you received an abuse complaint about this server? If so, can you forward it to me so I can investigate how it may have been created? ----------------- The node was found during system audit. May be you know that running tor (in any mode) is strictly forbidden by our Acceptable Use Policy because it can be used by third-parties for forwarding hidden illegal traffic. Unfortunately, we can start your VPS only in case you agree to remove tor. ----------------- I'll put aside the fact that your routers, DNS resolvers and every router of the internet also carries hidden illegal traffic, and that Tor is agnostic to that traffic as your routers are.
I did NOT know that running Tor was not allowed because I ASKED you if I could, and you told me it was fine as long as it did not generate Abuse Complaints. Considering your AUP is so broad it can be made to cover anything you don't like, the only reasonable thing someone can do is ask if you'll allow something - which I did. I'd like a pro-rated refund of my remaining service, as you have misrepresented your services and your Acceptable Use Policy to me - if I had known you wouldn't allow me to use my bandwidth in a way that was not illegal in any jurisdiction, did not generate any abuse complaints or additional work for you, and that you would shut down my service after I confirmed what I was doing was okay with you - I would never have paid you in the first place. ----------------- Ticket YXX-XXXX dates from 26 Mar 2012. Our Terms of Service are subject to change and, according to our Terms of Service http://www.sitevalley.com/terms/ posting of such changed Terms and Conditions on the site constitutes notice of such changes to you (although we may choose additional types of notice). Our policy regarding TOR usage has been changed and as for now, running TOR applications on our servers is forbidden. We are very sorry that this provision prevents you from using our services in the manner you need to use it.
All things considered, we can offer you two options:
1. We unsuspend your VPS, you remove TOR from it, let us know and we check it. or 2. We issue the partial refund and terminate your account with us.
Please rest assured that we value you as our customer and would like to continue doing business with you. Also, please accept our apologies for any inconvenience this misunderstanding has been the reason of. ----------------- Thank you Dmitriy. Please issue the partial refund and terminate the account. -----------------
-tom