Not long ago, we enabled the ModSecurity anti-hack firewall on all our servers to shield your hosting account from malicious online activity around the clock.

As the global practice has shown, however, hackers may find ways to infiltrate into the system surreptitiously (we all know that no one can possibly offer a 100% anti-hacker insurance) and manage to take over one of your hosts. Well, if that happens, it’s time for them to get ‘jailed’ in that host.

Through the new ‘Jail Host’ functionality, our web hosting system will outsmart the intruder by ‘jailing’ them.

What does the ‘Jail Host’ option stand for?

By activating the ‘Jail Host’ option for a given host, you practically isolate it from the other domains within the www/ directory of the same hosting account.

This way, if hackers try to attack the given host, they will be immediately ‘punished’ and ‘jailed’ in that host.

By being ‘jailed’, the intruders will not be able to use the host as a doorway to the rest of the system where the other hosts of yours are located.

This restriction works at the Operating System level, which will guarantee its efficiency in all cases of hack attacks on the given host.

When could I use the ‘Jail Host’ option?

The ‘Jail Host’ functionality can come in real handy when you hire a webmaster to work on your site. If you do not know the webmaster in person, then it would be reasonable to take all measures to protect your host.

In this case, most hosting providers would recommend giving the guy limited FTP access to the particular host. However, if the guy comes with cruel intentions, they will still be able to break the FTP barrier and to litter your account with malicious scripts. If you ‘jail’ the host first, you’ll never risk putting your hosting account as a whole at risk.

How do I activate the ‘Jail Host’ option?

The ‘Jail Host’ option is integrated into the Hosted Domains section of the Web Hosting Control Panel. It is available with all shared hosting plans, semi-dedicated servers and dedicated servers. The option is not available with our Virtual Private Servers because of its incompatibility with the virtualization technology.

In the Hosted Domains section, click on the Edit Host icon at the end of the Actions column:

The ‘Jail Host’ functionality is located at the bottom of the Edit Host form. Just tick the box and click on the Edit Host button:

Does the ‘Jail Host’ option involve any other restrictions?

From a ‘jailed’ host, you will not be able to access the files hosted under a different domain within the same account. So, if you want to use them, you will need to deactivate the ‘Jail Host’ option first.

However, all the other domains in the account will have access to the ‘jailed’ host’s file system.

•••

The ‘Jail Host’’ option helps users address a very specific security glitch, which lies deep under the surface.

Thus, it will add a new level of protection to your customers’ sites and will give you a very strong selling point in the eyes of prospective customers who are sensitive about online security. Actually, who isn’t?

What’s more, ‘Jail Host’ is a completely innovative option on the web hosting market and cannot be currently found readily implemented on any other hosting platform.

So what are you waiting for? Talk to your customers about security in a new and different way.