Is a static site hosting platform required to proactively monitor which content paying users host in your jurisdiction?
Wouldn't a solid set of processes to handle content complaints and knowing who your customers are in case the hosting country's law enforcement has a case suffice?
Or are you having some free tier where users can anonymously upload stuff?
In the latter case — a free place to stash megabytes — you'll need to detect password protected archives in addition to unencrypted content. Get ready for a perpetual game of whack-a-mole though.
Especially for phishing content, the requirement isn’t so much a legal one (though that’s important to watch for) as it is a practical one. People flagging phishing content on your domain can get your domain wiped from the internet. Trust me, we had a terrifying 8 hours at my day job a couple of years ago because of this.
We had to call our DNS provider who told us there was nothing they could do because it was blocked by the tld owner which was an Italian company. So we called anyone and everyone we could and tried to communicate in broken Italian until they finally agreed to lift the block. It was the worst day we ever had as a company.
Legal is not the only justification though. Depending on how visible the UGC is to other users, spam/porn/phishing could quickly degrade the site's user experience and reputation.
Comments
Is a static site hosting platform required to proactively monitor which content paying users host in your jurisdiction?
Wouldn't a solid set of processes to handle content complaints and knowing who your customers are in case the hosting country's law enforcement has a case suffice?
Or are you having some free tier where users can anonymously upload stuff?
In the latter case — a free place to stash megabytes — you'll need to detect password protected archives in addition to unencrypted content. Get ready for a perpetual game of whack-a-mole though.
Especially for phishing content, the requirement isn’t so much a legal one (though that’s important to watch for) as it is a practical one. People flagging phishing content on your domain can get your domain wiped from the internet. Trust me, we had a terrifying 8 hours at my day job a couple of years ago because of this.
Sounds like you got on the safe browsing list? How did you get it resolved?
We had to call our DNS provider who told us there was nothing they could do because it was blocked by the tld owner which was an Italian company. So we called anyone and everyone we could and tried to communicate in broken Italian until they finally agreed to lift the block. It was the worst day we ever had as a company.
Legal is not the only justification though. Depending on how visible the UGC is to other users, spam/porn/phishing could quickly degrade the site's user experience and reputation.