RE: general "best practices" question re: orphaned servers

I no longer handle colo equipment, but when I did we required our
resellers to have contact information for the owner of the equipment as
well as themselves, and identify which was which.  After 90 days of no
pay from the reseller or equipment abandon, I usually attempted contact
with owner of the equipment to see what they wanted.  Twice we ran into
a spot that the reseller had been accepting cash from them, but not
paying us with it.  That's when it got tricky.  Anyway that's a <rant>
for another day.

Blake Pfankuch

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]]
On Behalf Of JC Dill
Sent: Monday, March 17, 2008 11:53 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: general "best practices" question re: orphaned servers

Laurence F. Sheldon, Jr. wrote:

> What other people do is indeed interesting, but what you need to know
is 
> what will your lawyers defend.

I think the question might be a lot more interesting if you turned it 
upside down - what if you are a customer with one of these small hosting

outfits, and your colo host goes belly up?  What do you expect the colo 
facility to do with their customer's customer's equipment - your 
equipment?  You have no legal agreement with that company, but they are 
in possession of items that belong to you.

 From a legal standpoint, there are laws about how to handle abandoned 
property - both when you don't know who owns it and when you have some 
idea who it belongs to.  If you don't follow the letter of the law you 
could be in hot water.  I know that abandoned horses can't just be 
"taken" by a boarding stable owner to pay "back board" - they have to 
file legal papers claiming the animal has been abandoned, and then 
publicize and hold a public auction (the exact procedure varies from 
state to state).  The proceeds of the auction go towards paying the 
horse owner's back board.  BUT, if the person who was paying the board 
was not the "owner" of the horse, the stable has no right to claim, 
keep, auction, etc. someone else's horse.  Things can get very messy at 
that point.

jc

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-- 
Eat sushi frequently. - Avi
[email protected] is the human contact address.
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