News roundup from around the web this morning:

Earthquake Proof Hosting!

We've seen many buzzwords used in the hosting industry. Green, 99.9% Uptime, Unlimited and so forth. Today we have a new one: Earthquake Proof! UK-based host Smartbunker has a press release, available here, stating they have demonstrated to be earthquake proof. They were less than 30 miles from the UK's largest earthquake in 25 years, measuring 5.3 on the Richter scale. There is an interesting tidbit in the release:

The facility was designed and constructed to be shock resistant to counter the effects of a nuclear blast.

Can you say that about your webhost? Kidding aside, Smartbunker is definitely interesting. They also claim to have “Military Grade Physical Security”. I'm not sure what that means, but I am intimidated by it! Your data will be safe from nuclear attack and protected by a pseudo-military.

They also look to be a true “green” webhost. Their “Business & Environment” page says they are a zero-carbon host, getting their energy from wind turbines. They use bio-diesel backup generators and use the latest generation IBM blade servers. I'll drop in my obligatory “better than carbon credits” statement here. I hadn't heard of Smartbunker, they are definitely interesting.

Unlimited!

Speaking of Unlimited, Lunarpages announced unlimited add-on domains for their customers. There used to be a limit of 10 add-on domains for the basic and business plans. Now customers are free to have as many as 100 million domains. Why? According to the press release, “because they love you”.

 

Cirrus Tech Upgrades Linux VPS

Toronto based webhost Cirrus Tech announced they have upgraded their Linux VPS services. They now offer Debian 4 on VPS. They have upgraded from Fedora Core 5 to Fedora Core 7, and from CentOS 4 to CentOS 5. Have you used Cirrus Tech? Be the first to write a review.

Web Server Security

Enterprise Networking Planet has an in-depth article titled “Learn Best Practices for Web Server Security”. It is a useful read. The article is targeted more toward the server side of things, but it is worthwhile to check out. If you have made directories “world-writable” during installation and didn't change them back, this is essential reading for you. The issues covered may not affect you directly, but it is a well-written security article.

Do you have anything to say about any of this? Leave a comment! Thank you.