Clients stealing my work!

Shrug · 07-20-2006, 07:17 PM

Hi, I am new to this forum, so I am sorry if this is in the wrong section.

When I am designing a site, is there a way to put in some kind of back door page or script which would allow me to delete the site even if my client changes thier ftp password? I have had several people do this in order to avoid trying to pya the balance of thier contracts. I get a deposit, finish the site, and then bam, they lock me out of ftp.
My only recourse after that is to take my contracts and sue them in small claims court. That wastes a lot of time and effort.
It would be great if I could just go in and disable the whole site from a hidden page until they pay.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanol · 07-20-2006, 08:06 PM

I'm sure you could mange that though php (with the function unlink() ) fairly easily; heck you could probably embed it in part of their site without them noticing. The only problem is that they'll probably have a back up of the site, since they have FTP access.

I suppose you could keep the files on your own server until you finish them, or something like that.

DaveyBoy · 07-20-2006, 08:52 PM

As long as you are showing them a live example of the site, whether it's on your web space or theirs, they are going to be able to steal it if they want to. This is why you should always take 50% upfront, just to insure against this stuff.

You do get some dishonest people out there and we have all be stung in the past, just bad luck really

Kalina · 07-20-2006, 09:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shrug

Hi, I am new to this forum, so I am sorry if this is in the wrong section.

When I am designing a site, is there a way to put in some kind of back door page or script which would allow me to delete the site even if my client changes thier ftp password? I have had several people do this in order to avoid trying to pya the balance of thier contracts. I get a deposit, finish the site, and then bam, they lock me out of ftp.
My only recourse after that is to take my contracts and sue them in small claims court. That wastes a lot of time and effort.
It would be great if I could just go in and disable the whole site from a hidden page until they pay.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Yeah, what would possess you to build it on their server? You build it locally or on your own server, and if it's some kind of scripting language other then HTML they can't steal it as it gets parsed by the browser, they're not getting the actual code.

imaginemn · 07-20-2006, 09:15 PM

As others said. You should never build on their servers unless they pre-pay. I would use something like clients.YOURDOMAINNAME.com/clientname or something similar so they can preview the work. After it's all completed, PAID FOR and approved. Then move it over to their server(s). It a little more work but a great way to prevent them from taking what you build.

You could always try to contact their ISP and report them or something. I would stay away from any type of backdoor. I know a developer that got sued for having a backdoor and almost lost his business over this. I believe it's illegal to build in a backdoor to a system you do not own or the client have full disclosure of the backdoor.

Casey Byshop · 07-21-2006, 02:26 AM

A back door would be unethical, building on your own server is ideal and often including hosing in the package works well. I had someone not pay me so i took the site down....22 phonecalls in an hour and a cheque the next morning.!

serverextreme · 07-21-2006, 05:46 AM

Hello I for one would not build any site for anyone one on there server.
I have a client right now that wanted me to build a site for him so I did
BUT! he has not yet payed for his hosting service yet so I will not allow access
to any of the contents or cpanel.

People will say anything to get something for FREE I have seem this alot what they don't realize is we have control not them. Ounce you give them acess they can do as they please I don't know about you but I want to get payed in full before I give anyone access to any files...