Ask HN: Recommend a dedicated server provider that doesn't mind port scanning | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Recommend a dedicated server provider that doesn't mind port scanning

10 pointsdsacco7 comments

Hey HN,

As part of a research project I conduct internet-wide IPv4 scans (usually ports 80, 443 and ICMP). I also do DNS lookups across all .com/.net domains and reverse DNS lookups across all active IPv4s.

I'm building a daily timeseries for all of this, and I publish most of the raw data online, for example: https://mirrors.sorengard.com/zmap_scans (not a commercial link or service). It comes out to about 200GB/day. I also keep PTR records mapping each of my scanning IP addresses to a host that explains it's non-targeted research, it doesn't look for specific vulnerabilities or exploit them, etc.

Unfortunately after a couple of months of doing this my current hosting provider has asked me to stop the scans or leave the service. They're nice about it, they're just rebranding and no longer want to allow port scanning. So now I'm looking for (preferably dedicated) server providers that don't mind public scanning activity as long as it's non-threatening.

Thanks!

https://bestwest.host/ hqservers@injabber.info has been acceptable. $220 a month, pushes over 1Mpps for weeks at a time. You should probably contact them over jabber if you want a scanning server.

Occasional downtimes, but not terrible for scan servers.

There are much better options available if you can bring your own IPs.

Thanks for the suggestion. That might be especially useful if I decide to diversify regions too.

> There are much better options available if you can bring your own IPs.

Like what?

Like, almost anywhere. If you have your own IPs abuse emails will not reach your host, and your host most likely won't care at all. There are some places which are more vigilant, but that's far from the norm.

https://www.nforce.com/ is a popular destination.

edit: The jabber address I posted earlier was completely wrong, correct one is "hqservers@injabber.info"

Tip: buy some proxies and traceroute the IP addresses you get to find the rdns names of the providers who don't mind stuff like that.

I forgot these links: DNS and rDNS lookups on https://mirrors.sorengard.com/dns_lookups and https://mirrors.sorengard.com/rdns_lookups respectively.

does amazon, heroku, or google not allow this?

Nope. It’s stated in their acceptable use policies.

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