RiftLayer

Legal

Acceptable Use Policy

This Acceptable Use Policy defines what you can and cannot do with RiftLayer’s services. It’s designed to protect our customers, our network, and the wider internet.

Last updated: January 1, 2025

1. Purpose of this Policy

This Acceptable Use Policy (“AUP”) forms part of your agreement with RiftLayer and applies to all use of our Services. It sets out behavior that is not allowed on our network and systems.

If you violate this AUP, we may suspend, restrict, or terminate your Services, with or without prior notice, depending on the severity and urgency of the situation.

2. Your responsibilities

You are responsible for:

  • All activity originating from your services, whether performed by you or your users.
  • Ensuring your use of the Services complies with all applicable laws and regulations.
  • Keeping your software updated and reasonably secure.
  • Monitoring your game servers or applications for abuse by players or users.

3. Prohibited content

You may not use our Services to store, host, or transmit content that is illegal, harmful, or otherwise violates this AUP. This includes, but is not limited to:

  • Content that is illegal under applicable law (for example, in the U.S. and your local jurisdiction).
  • Malware, trojans, viruses, or any other malicious code.
  • Hate speech or content that incites violence or harassment.
  • Child sexual abuse material (CSAM) or any exploitation of minors.
  • Content that infringes on intellectual property rights (e.g., pirated games, software, or media).
  • Instructions or tools primarily designed to commit crimes or attacks (e.g., DDoS panels, booters, stressers).

4. Network & system abuse

You may not use our Services in any way that interferes with the normal operation of our network, other customers, or the internet at large. Prohibited activities include:

  • Launching, participating in, or facilitating distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks.
  • Port scanning, vulnerability scanning, or probing systems without explicit permission.
  • Operating public proxies, TOR exit nodes, open relays, or similar services intended to anonymize abuse.
  • Generating excessive broadcast or multicast traffic without authorization.
  • Interfering with or attempting to bypass network security controls or rate limits.

5. Resource usage & fair use

Our goal is to keep performance consistent and predictable for all customers. To that end, we may impose fair use limits on shared resources such as CPU, disk I/O, and network bandwidth.

Examples of resource misuse include:

  • Running CPU or disk-intensive tasks that exceed the intended usage of your plan.
  • Using shared services as a replacement for dedicated compute or storage when it clearly exceeds normal game hosting patterns.
  • Hosting file mirrors, backup archives, or unrelated large data sets on plans meant for game servers.

If your usage affects system stability or other customers’ performance, we may: ask you to optimize your setup, move you to a more appropriate plan, or temporarily limit resource usage.

6. Game hosting specifics

Because RiftLayer focuses on game hosting, we see a lot of modded servers, custom plugins, and interesting setups. That’s fine, as long as:

  • Your game servers are not primarily used to harass individuals or groups.
  • You do not encourage players to attack other servers or networks.
  • You do not use game servers to host or distribute cheats, cracks, or exploits for other games or services.
  • You comply with the respective game publisher’s terms and mod policies.

If you run a public network (for example, a large Minecraft or Rust community), you are also responsible for moderating your player base and dealing with in-game abuse reports in a reasonable way.

7. Email & IP reputation

To protect our IP reputation and deliverability, you may not use the Services to send unsolicited bulk email or spam. This includes:

  • Mass marketing emails without proper consent and unsubscribe options.
  • Using our IPs to send phishing or fraudulent messages.
  • Operating bulk mailers or mail lists that do not comply with anti-spam laws (such as CAN-SPAM, GDPR, etc.).

We may restrict or block outbound email from certain services, or require you to use a third-party email provider for bulk or transactional email.

8. Security testing & exploits

You may not use RiftLayer’s Services to perform penetration testing or security scanning against third-party systems unless you have explicit written permission from the target owner.

You may perform reasonable, limited testing against your own services hosted with us, as long as it does not impact the stability of our network or other customers. If you plan large-scale testing, please contact us first.

Attempting to exploit or bypass security controls on our infrastructure, management systems, or panel is strictly prohibited.

9. Reporting abuse

If you believe a RiftLayer customer is violating this AUP or using our Services for abuse, you can report it to us. Please include as much detail as possible (timestamps, logs, IPs, and a clear description of the issue) so we can investigate quickly.

Abuse reports can be sent to:

  • Email: abuse@riftlayer.example
  • Ticket portal: (link to abuse / report form)

10. Enforcement & actions

If we determine that you have violated this AUP, we may take one or more of the following actions, depending on the severity and impact:

  • Issue a warning and request that you correct the issue.
  • Temporarily suspend or rate-limit your service.
  • Filter or block certain types of traffic.
  • Terminate one or more services, or your account as a whole.
  • In serious cases, cooperate with law enforcement or other appropriate authorities.

We try to be reasonable and fair, but we must also protect our infrastructure, our other customers, and the wider internet.

11. Changes to this AUP

We may update this Acceptable Use Policy from time to time. When we make material changes, we will update the “Last updated” date at the top of this page and may provide additional notice through our website, status page, or client area.

Your continued use of the Services after any changes become effective means you accept the updated Policy.

12. Contact

If you have questions about this Acceptable Use Policy or how it applies to your specific setup, you can contact us at:

  • Email: support@riftlayer.example
  • Abuse / security: abuse@riftlayer.example
  • Ticket portal: (link to your client area)