RackNerd TOS silence cuts both ways. They can always update it retroactively. "Silent means allowed" is how people got burned by Contabo—Contabo's ToS had IRC language, just vague enough to mean whatever abuse wanted.
I want a provider that says "IRC" explicitly in the TOS, not just not-against. Does this exist?
Not in my three months. The closest is Vultr's explicit allow, which comes with the implicit "until DDoS" caveat. The HostHatch email is the next closest.
What I have not tried: actual dedicated servers. OVHcloud's So You Start brand, Kimsufi. The ToS archaeology there is harder because they bury it in French first.
I have a Kimsufi KS-1 in Gravelines. The French ToS mentions "serveurs de discussion" which translates broadly. I run ngircd. One abuse report in four years, for a Tor exit node I briefly tested—not IRC related. They asked, I explained, no termination.
OVHcloud proper is stricter than Kimsufi in practice. The budget brands have less automated abuse pipeline.
This matches my experience with Hetzner, though they are not in the list. Their robot console flagged my IRC port scan immediately. Manual review took two days. Cleared, but stressful.
For actual verified hosts: what about BuyVM? They allow IRC, have DDoS protection that does not nullroute immediately, and their TOS is explicit. $2/month. Las Vegas, New York, Luxembourg, Miami.
BuyVM is not in my original list but I have heard this before. Their TOS says "IRC and related services are permitted." The DDoS protection is Voxility-based, which scrubs rather than nullroutes. This is the technical difference that matters.
I will add them to month four of the archaeology. Still want to hear from someone who actually got attacked on BuyVM and survived it.
I got nullrouted on BuyVM last year. 12-hour outage, automatic. Ticket response: "Voxility scrubbed for 45 minutes, attack persisted, nullroute as per policy." Survived, yes. Uninterrupted, no.
There is no host that absorbs an indefinite DDoS for $2/month. The question is whether they work with you or terminate you. BuyVM worked with me. Contabo terminated. That is the actual difference.
