20 Low-End VPS Providers Shutting Down in a 'Deadpooling' Scam

An anonymous reader writes: At least 20 web hosting providers have hastily notified customers today, Saturday, December 7, that they plan to shut down on Monday, giving their clients two days to download data from their accounts before servers are shut down and wiped clean. No refunds are being provided. As several users have pointed out, the VPS providers don't list physical addresses, don't list proper business registration information, and have no references to their ownership.

A source in the web hosting industry who wanted to remain anonymous told ZDNet that what happened this weekend is referred to as "deadpooling" — namely, the practice of setting up a small web hosting company, providing ultra-cheap VPS servers for a few dollars a month, and then shutting down a few months later, without refunding customers. "This is a systemic issue within the low-end market, we call it deadpooling," the source told us. "It doesn't happen often at this scale, however."

The 20 companies are: ArkaHosting, Bigfoot Servers, DCNHost, HostBRZ, HostedSimply, Hosting73, KudoHosting, LQHosting, MegaZoneHosting, n3Servers, ServerStrong, SnowVPS, SparkVPS, StrongHosting, SuperbVPS, SupremeVPS, TCNHosting, UMaxHosting, WelcomeHosting, X4Servers