***WARNING **** New "GSP's" stealing content (Copy, images, plus other stuff)

[Johnny5_Hull]

Hi Guys n Gals,

 

Just a heads up....

 

Our legal team have pointed out 2, yes 2 wannabe GSPs who have stolen our site content (word for word in places) as well as images we have created..... one of them even has the cheek to claim THEY are all the sole property of theirs, and not to be re-used on other sites

 

Bothe of the below culprits are using TCadmin, so they will no doubt frequent these forums, and no doubt had access to all your sites!

 

www.game-core.us

 

and

 

www.dedicatedgamers.eu

 

I thought I would post them up, as having gone through their sites, there is also copy and image content that is NOT ours, but does look familiar, so there is the chance that it could have come from one of your sites........ (ok ok yes, I do ceck your sites out regularly, who doesn't )

 

Both have been issued with "friendly" requests to remove our IP, with legals to follow in the event they dont.

 

Certainly worth looking into whether they have used any of your content too.

[dimitrifrom31]

thats kinda why I asked few days ago if TCA could disable some wanabe's licences when they were obviously doing illegal business or this kind of lame behaviour you mentionned.

That would give to the real TCA users some kind of basic protection even if it wouldnt stop the whole stuff.

[Johnny5_Hull]

Although I would love TCA to do that, I'm not too sure it would be legal for them to do so, plus I suppose as long as they haven't done anything to rip off TCA, then the issue isn't one for Louis to get involved with.

 

Although, if your listening TCA elves......... I secretly do want their license terminating, and their hands chopping off ;)

[Guest louise]

I'm sure you have to look into the fact that Laws are different in each country where the data is hosted.

 

Let your Solicitor do your work and contact the relevant company's and people.

 

But i guess not everyone has the extra money these days and getting the money back you spent to do this can be a long process sometimes

 

You can contact there ISP and send a Cease And Desist Notice if they abuse you after the friendly contact and also contact there main dedicated or co location host

 

Just document everything

 

its a shame this has happened as you have a nice website there

Good luck in shutting them down.

[dimitrifrom31]

you can also try to trick them just like I did with some illegal hosts who were contacting my customers to take them.

Pretend ur some kind of authority and request some official documents, the kids believe it and close their web and services right away cuz they are scared to get slapped by parents.

[Johnny5_Hull]

It was actually our groups legal department who notified us of this as they check for plagiarism, so it will be them following up.

 

As said, I have sent them a nice request asking them to remove the content, and if not then we will issue a cease and desist.

 

Unfortunately it isnt the first time this has happened some lowlife ripped 2 of our groups websites previously, and yest it was extremely expensive to have it sorted as they didn't go lightly.

 

Needless to say, it cost them a hell of a lot more in the long run

 

Thanks for the heads up guys, always good to see us REAL GSP's stick together

[HGN-Daniel]

"Wannabe" GSPs aren't the only ones that do this. I've seen at least one relatively well known provider do this. It's pathetic and disgusting that they don't have the brain power to write their own content.

[KOhosting]

Oh wow! That is pathetic. If they are going to create their own business, they could atleast create their own graphics and content. We did have a similar problem when we first setup our Game Servers page and then my graphics guy added another layer to every image. So far as being considered legal, you all really are going about it the wrong way. Being legal is easy, to be legal here all you have to have is a $25.00 business license, and a Federal Tax #(or your SS#). I would say that we would be better served by creating a group of GSPs(as here) that help look out for one another. Heck noone would be out anything as we could just use the TCA forums for it(if they didn't mind). Then put together a list(as we find them) of GSPs that steal content and run a shady business, and then make said list public.

 

Just my two cents

[dimitrifrom31]

ye theres a french one who totally copied old gameserve*s.com template basically same colors same theme just slightly different pics and even askedhere in TCA forums what ppl thought about his "new" design lol.

[dimitrifrom31]

Oh wow! That is pathetic. If they are going to create their own business, they could atleast create their own graphics and content. We did have a similar problem when we first setup our Game Servers page and then my graphics guy added another layer to every image. So far as being considered legal, you all really are going about it the wrong way. Being legal is easy, to be legal here all you have to have is a $25.00 business license, and a Federal Tax #(or your SS#). I would say that we would be better served by creating a group of GSPs(as here) that help look out for one another. Heck noone would be out anything as we could just use the TCA forums for it(if they didn't mind). Then put together a list(as we find them) of GSPs that steal content and run a shady business, and then make said list public.

 

Just my two cents

 

hiring a hacker to get their servers/website down would be cheaper and faster

[Guest louise]

And would be illegal and could result in you being prosecuted.

 

I thought we where professionals and not to actually think or doing about something as the above, maybe i'm mistaken ....

[DougK94]

And the one is using a cracked version of WHMCS

[Johnny5_Hull]

Being legal is easy, to be legal here all you have to have is a $25.00 business license, and a Federal Tax #(or your SS#).

 

Not much different here, just as long as you are registered with companies house, and keep the tax man happy etc, and your good. Both of which we do...

 

Needless to say due to both of them ignoring my nice email requests, the legal teams can sort it out, just a pain in the rear having to sort it out, but hey..... such is life.

 

BTW, liking the idea of a dodgy GSP listing..... name and shame I say, well only because beheading is frowed on these days

[Johnny5_Hull]

And the one is using a cracked version of WHMCS

 

OOOOhh just noticed this one, which one.... as Im sure Matt over at WHMCS would love to know. They do take that very seriously, and Im sure there have been posts over there requesting peeps report people doing just this

[Derek]

Who cares they are going to die anyways.

[swish]

I agree with Derek here....Some of us on here have been around for quite a few years....I gave up on the stolen content fight years ago.

 

Its just much easier to say use whatever you want on my site, and then watch them die once the next months server bill comes in...the waybackmachine doesnt lie to say it was mine first lol.

[Steven Crothers]

Swish,

 

If you've given up, I'm soooo stealing your site. It's made of awesome in my eyes.

[Johnny5_Hull]

Swish,

 

If you've given up, I'm soooo stealing your site. It's made of awesome in my eyes.

 

 

lol

 

Very true, and tbh, the great thing is, the reason our legal team noticed this was when they were checking our NEW (but not published yet) site for duplication and copyright infringements.

 

So they have stuff which is ripped off our our soon to be old site anyway

[swish]

Swish,

 

If you've given up, I'm soooo stealing your site. It's made of awesome in my eyes.

 

TAKE IT! TAKE IT ALLLLLLLLL lol.

[SickPuppy]

I agree that using another GSP’s content without their permission is not the right thing to do.

 

What I am more concerned with is the GSP that is using hacked software like operating systems, WHMCS, Teamspeak, and even TCAdmin. I have turned in a few companies using illegal software but nothing ever gets done. You might get a few Teamspeak IP addresses blacklisted but that is about it. I reported companies to Microsoft for violating their license agreements. I have reported one company that advertises on their website that their dedicated servers use Windows XP Home edition as the operating system and Microsoft does nothing. All we can do is continue to report these violations and try to protect our website content.

 

But remember this if you are using a screenshot from a game and I like it, I will copy that screenshot as you have no copyright authority over it. That is like complaining about someone taking something from you that you took from someone else.

[GS-Liam]

TAKE IT! TAKE IT ALLLLLLLLL lol.

 

Well you do have a nice modern design:rolleyes::rolleyes:

 

 

http://www.dedicatedgamers.eu/ Is showing a mysql error Didnt take long for them to go down,

[silverstarke]

My opinion is that its not only ennoying when they steal graphics and content, its also very frustrating when they are illegaly hosting gameservers etc at really low prices to make legal gsp's almost impossible to stay.

[dimitrifrom31]

My opinion is that its not only ennoying when they steal graphics and content, its also very frustrating when they are illegaly hosting gameservers etc at really low prices to make legal gsp's almost impossible to stay.

 

help authorities closing them if you know any. usually warning the company that you know about their illegal business is enough to make them close by themselves before getting into troubles.

a simple whois on their domain name and you can directly contact the domain owner so he gona take full responsability.

[Tazz]

well you can't find owners details in Domain Whois if they have Data Protected there details & if your thinking about hacking there servers your more unprofessional then they are.

 

All I do for illegal GSP's is report them to vBulletin, TeamSpeak, WHMCS, etc if they are using there software illegally but I had one Company who copied content from me and Linx-Hosting and now have been shut down as we reported them to TeamSpeak as well for Hosting TS Servers illegally

[Tazz]

and talking about Stealing Content does anyone know what other company uses this navigation with same colour as i am sure i seen it before the GSP using it now had it

 

 

it looks like WHMCS's Navigation