Zayo Extortion

Mon Aug 15 14:13:46 UTC 2016

Yeah, I see a wall of text, but no real evidence to substantiate it.

On Mon, Aug 15, 2016 at 8:29 AM, Mike Hammett <nanog at ics-il.net> wrote:

> Try more facts and less emotion.
>
>
>
> -----
> Mike Hammett
> Intelligent Computing Solutions
>
> Midwest Internet Exchange
>
> The Brothers WISP
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
>
> From: "HonorFirst Name Ethics via NANOG" <nanog at nanog.org>
> To: nanog at nanog.org
> Sent: Saturday, August 13, 2016 11:50:46 AM
> Subject: Zayo Extortion
>
> Question to the NANOG community, Is anyone else being extorted by Zayo? Is
> Zayo threatening shutdown over bogus and fabricated charges?
>
> The purpose of this message to the group is twofold: 1) to share our
> experience being extorted by Zayo with the community and 2) to understand
> the depth and extent of Zayo's less than ethical behavior by getting
> feedback from the community.
>
> Abovenet was a great organization with quality service, reasonable prices
> and nice folks to work with. Since being acquired by Zayo we have seen a
> significant degradation of service quality and responsiveness which is not
> unusual from a provider, but Zayo has taken things to a level of low ethics
> that would make Tony Soprano proud.
> Most interestingly they seem to identify points where you are dependent on
> them and threaten a shut down unless you pay them some arbitrary amount. In
> our case we use multiple Zayo IP, Transport, and Colo Services -- they set
> their extortion amount at $128,000. A completely arbitrary and fabricated
> number. They put significant pressure threatening to shut us down by
> setting their lawyers on us.
> Our detailed contract breakdowns, invoice and payment spreadsheets, along
> with all other commonsense and professional efforts were simply
> disregarded. At one point their lawyers and accounting people had the nerve
> to say "our accounting system does not track invoice details -- it only
> shows the total amount due so your numbers mean nothing to us." All the
> while they relentlessly levied disconnect threats with short timelines such
> as: "if you don't pay us $128,000 by this Friday, we will shut your
> operation down."
> We have had anecdotal feedback that we are not alone in our experience and
> that there are many more like us. If you and your company have had a
> similar experience with Zayo, please share it with the group or if like us
> you are concerned about retaliation from Zayo, please respond privately.
>
> If the group shares their experiences the public shaming may drive Zayo to
> stop operating like mafia thugs. If the problem is as common as we suspect,
> it may warrant getting the Attorney General involved.
>
> In the mean time, I strongly urge anyone already in a relationship with
> Zayo or considering a relationship to make sure your are well diversified
> with other more ethical carriers. Otherwise please consider another
> organization to work with.
> In our case we were better of with Ransomeware, than Zayo as a vendor! Its
> cheaper and less damaging
>
> A Zayo victim and a NANOG Member
>

-- 
Regards,
Paras

President
ProTraf Solutions, LLC
Enterprise DDoS Mitigation