Advice Needed

[Chris_J]

My site was hosted by Blank and it was managed buy one of there employees, this guy has been hosting the forum for 6 months with no problems. He took wind that I was going to do something with my forum that he didn't agree with so he removed my name as the Administrator and my access to the control panel, he closed 3 of my top forums and redirected it to his site which he just started this week, of course there just happened to be about the same thing I was doing on my forum. He will not give me the database which I have over 13,000 members. I need some advice on what I should do about this.

Thanks
Chris

 

[Michael Wechsler]

Originally posted by Chris J:
My site was hosted by Blank and it was managed buy one of there employees, this guy has been hosting the forum for 6

First, do you have a written agreement. Most important of all. Second, I am assuming that this is your web site, you own this company, they are a typical hosting solution.

He took wind that I was going to do something with my forum that he didn't agree with so he removed my name as the Administrator and my access to the control panel, he closed 3 of my top forums and redirected it to his site which he just started this week, of course there just happened to be about the same thing I was doing on my forum.

You are joking? Wow... What you were going to do -- would it damage his hosting system or put it in jeopardy, i.e. you were going to provide access to illegal software, do something to compromise the security of the site? I assume no. Additionally, what was he hired to do? It seems that he hosted the site and then would moderate message boards?

He will not give me the database which I have over 13,000 members. I need some advice on what I should do about this.

Hmmm... Since when does he own the database? Did you sign this away? It doesn't sound like it. Given assumptions (and there are a lot here), it seems that this host might have gotten himself into a heap of liability.

Most important.... again.... you MUST find the Agreement you signed if you have one.

 

[Michael Wechsler]

Well, there may not be a written agreement but a clickthrough agreement. There is a question as to enforceability of some of these. However, if there is a terms of service for the site, this is important. I would highly question any TOS or clickthrough that somewhere said you agree to assign away all of the rights to the site you are hosting, including the user database. There is also a serious privacy issue where users of your system are unaware of or may not have notification that a third party may have access to personally identifiable information. A real pro would probably know, IMHO, that you don't just grab this kind of data and just "use" it. Users do have rights ya know. This is very odd...

 

[Chris_J]

<<First, do you have a written agreement. Most important of all. Second, I am assuming that this is your web site, you own this company, they are a typical hosting solution.>>

No written agreement, he was a member of my forum and when I needed to find a new place to host my forum he stepped in and said he could do it in exchange for the business he was working for banner be added to the site.


<<You are joking? Wow... What you were going to do -- would it damage his hosting system or put it in jeopardy, i.e. you were going to provide access to illegal software, do something to compromise the security of the site? I assume no. Additionally, what was he hired to do? It seems that he hosted the site and then would moderate message boards?>>


He was hired really for security, my site was getting hacked a lot so he said he could stop all this with the program knowledge he had.


<<Hmmm... Since when does he own the database? Did you sign this away? It doesn't sound like it. Given assumptions (and there are a lot here), it seems that this host might have gotten himself into a heap of liability.

Most important.... again.... you MUST find the Agreement you signed if you have one.>>


Update:

Found out yesterday that when we moved our database from UBB message forum to VB " like the one you are using". I gave him all the access codes password etc. He didn't transfer it to my VB he went ahead and bought his own and moved all the data to his forum using my own domain.

 

[brian]

Sue the bastard. But here is a good idea -- report this as a theft to the police. While you may have a civil case to recover monetary damages, this is theft of your property. Now you have leverage.