# Ding! Dong! Santrex is dead!



## Francisco

Thank you to a helpful soul on WHT for passing along a very interesting email that states Santrex, the scum of the internet, is bankrupt and closing up shop:



> We regret to inform you that due to internal network issues and recent downtime, we have moved your account directly to our partner in Lithuania to provide you with a replacement service, for you to be able to receive your new VPS details, you will have to email [email protected] direcly quoting the email address you hold on our system to be able to start using your service again.
> 
> Once they receive your email they will confirm with us, and deliver your order, they'll also invoice you directly from now onwards, our partner is in no way responsible for your downtime, refunds or balances, they are only acting on our behalf to provide you with services as we no longer are in business to provide you with any services:
> 
> Netherlands and Ukraine services: Please backup your data as the servers will be shut down within 7 working days.
> 
> All other locations: Due to downtime and data losses you may just request your service from our partner free of charge.
> 
> ***** Please note that Santrex is no longer going to provide any services of any kind, and since we're unable to do so, we're doing our best to provide you with services to minimize the losses on your end, we will not be able to refund any balances you may have had with us, and the deal with our partner will ONLY be 30 days free of charge from the date of delivery, if you have paid us any longer periods for your server we will try our best to fulfil after 30 days, there is no guarantee what so ever that we will be able to do so *****
> 
> ***** Please do not reply back to this email, and deal directly with our partner *****
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Santrex team


It has been a *long* time coming. At one point they had an entire /19 or even an /18 listed with spamhaus

and other BL's for all of the botnets, booters, & spammers they hosted. They ended up *renumbering* customers

instead of trying to cleanup the subnets.

Francisco


----------



## splitice

Now I need a new comparison to use for bad hosts. "downtime like Scamtrex (Santrex)" was a very effective comparison for getting hosts to pick up their game.


----------



## Jack

So did Santrex ever get there own IPv4 space? if so I wonder what they will do with it...


----------



## Patrick

Last time I heard about them they were using NForce's PayPal address to accept PP payments


----------



## scv

Jack said:


> So did Santrex ever get there own IPv4 space? if so I wonder what they will do with it...


They own 46.166.128.0/18 - even if it does get auctioned off I'm sure it'll go cheap considering how much abuse has come from that range.


----------



## Jack

scv said:


> They own 46.166.128.0/18 - even if it does get auctioned off I'm sure it'll go cheap considering how much abuse has come from that range.


Still a /18 to someone in the EU would be good... considering to go to RIPE you'll only get a /22.


----------



## ChrisM

I seen this coming!


----------



## Francisco

Jack said:


> Still a /18 to someone in the EU would be good... considering to go to RIPE you'll only get a /22.


The range is extremely dirty so it won't go well.

Francisco


----------



## Jack

Francisco said:


> The range is extremely dirty so it won't go well.
> 
> 
> Francisco


Balticservers is dirty I am sure they won't mind probably included in the 'sale'/'takeover'.


----------



## Reece-DM

Shocked this didn't happen a few years back.

Well atleast they managed to bankrupt than get raped by the police.


----------



## Francisco

Jack said:


> Balticservers is dirty I am sure they won't mind probably included in the 'sale'/'takeover'.


Are they?? That's a shame  Their owner/rep seems to be a nice fellow.

I know I yelled at him at one point but that's because it originally seemed like his website was a rip of someone elses. Ended up they were both his sites, just translated 

Francisco


----------



## Francisco

Reece said:


> Shocked this didn't happen a few years back.
> 
> Well atleast they managed to bankrupt than get raped by the police.


Last I heard the owner was in Egypt so it isn't like they could touch him anyways.

Francisco


----------



## Jack

Francisco said:


> Are they?? That's a shame  Their owner/rep seems to be a nice fellow.
> 
> 
> I know I yelled at him at one point but that's because it originally seemed like his website was a rip of someone elses. Ended up they were both his sites, just translated
> 
> 
> Francisco



I am sure he allows you to host stuff like warez ect big host at WJunction (If that still exists)


----------



## bzImage

splitice said:


> Now I need a new comparison to use for bad hosts.


ChicagoVPS?


----------



## Francisco

Jack said:


> I am sure he allows you to host stuff like warez ect big host at WJunction (If that still exists)


Well, look at the country they're in  I'm pretty sure if you look for any EU DC they'll have the same results.

Francisco


----------



## Jack

Looks like RiotSecurity is sharing his love with you Fran, More than writing a blog post this time though.


----------



## shovenose

Heh I'll take their IP block if they don't want it - glad to see these guys go I've seen some nasty stff coming to our network from them.


----------



## Kruno

You are too late. Their /18 is already mnt-by DUOMENUCENTRAS-MNT. In other words, BalticServers already took it.


----------



## Francisco

Kruno said:


> You are too late. Their /18 is already mnt-by DUOMENUCENTRAS-MNT. In other words, BalticServers already took it.


It's going to take a long time for that subnet to calm down. There's likely sooooo much bot traffic on it.

Francisco


----------



## RiotSecurity

Jack said:


> Balticservers is dirty I am sure they won't mind probably included in the 'sale'/'takeover'.


Some booters from hf skids are hosted there.

Here's a nice list of companies who run booters for hackforums skiddies:

Phantom Stresser - 93.115.93.45


YouDown - 37.221.160.37


Legion Stresser - 89.248.161.144


illuminati Stresser - 89.248.161.157


Destress Booter - 37.221.160.124


Hyper Stresser - 192.241.151.17


DDoSEM - 93.114.43.131


Dynasty Stresser - 198.27.120.192


MasterBoot - 198.58.110.52


Chaos Stresser - 108.61.24.115


SnowStresser - 198.12.15.203


BigBangBooter - 198.12.15.205


reBOOT/complexity - 198.12.14.86


Refiend Stresser - 173.245.31.245


Titanium Stresser - 198.46.158.94


PowerStresser - 94.102.51.123


Anonymous Stresser - 8.2.120.122


QuantomStresser - 82.221.96.224

(mostly voxility/ecatel, however you see cnservers ddos protection there, etc)


----------



## rds100

Ok, Santrex is down the drain. When will Ecatel follow them? That would be the real good news for the internet.


----------



## Francisco

rds100 said:


> Ok, Santrex is down the drain. When will Ecatel follow them? That would be the real good news for the internet.


There's russian mob money behind that one I'm sure.

Francisco


----------



## serverian

Don't forget the Fortatrust


----------



## Francisco

serverian said:


> Don't forget the Fortatrust


But do they host a lot of trash or are *owned* by trash?

Francisco


----------



## serverian

Francisco said:


> But do they host a lot of trash or are *owned* by trash?
> 
> 
> Francisco


Well, they are not as bad as Santrex or Ecatel but they are still a shame for the industry.


----------



## kro

Aww, that's just sad.
They were friggen popular back in the day.

I actually discovered LEB/LET because i was trying to find another provider who was dirty cheap. What I found was treasure!

Worst uptime ever, but for what we were using them back then for, it was to be expected!


----------



## splitice

I once saw a full months downtime, of course I had abandoned them by then (for BuyVM) but didn't cancel the subscription. 1 day after bill, dispute, and then lost. Now I really want to know what they said to Paypal to win their dispute, I am still surprised they managed to hold a Paypal account given the number of disputes they probably had.

Glad to see them gone, I doubt they will be missed by anyone other than the scum of the earth who where willing to put up with close to 50% uptime.


----------



## Francisco

kro said:


> Aww, that's just sad.
> 
> They were friggen popular back in the day.
> 
> I actually discovered LEB/LET because i was trying to find another provider who was dirty cheap. What I found was treasure!
> 
> Worst uptime ever, but for what we were using them back then for, it was to be expected!


I don't doubt they were still popular but it's likely that a lot of people didn't bother reading the email yet. Most of their locations should be going dark in the next few days so there'll likely be a big melt down over it.

Francisco


----------



## prometeus

I think they will eventually replaced by someone else. There is lot of money floating in some gray / black areas of the net...


----------



## serverian




----------



## Amitz

^ and that is who?


----------



## serverian

Amitz said:


> ^ and that is who?


Owner it seems. Khalid Cook


----------



## Gary

INIZ said:


> Last time I heard about them they were using NForce's PayPal address to accept PP payments


Unsurprising, considering what NForce host, and where the company came from. Warez central. Wouldn't surprise me if 50% of their business was P2L.


----------



## blergh

Gary said:


> Unsurprising, considering what NForce host, and where the company came from. Warez central. Wouldn't surprise me if 50% of their business was P2L.


lol so true, p2l indeed. That and rented shitty  5TB sites.


----------



## Patrick

scv said:


> They own 46.166.128.0/18 - even if it does get auctioned off I'm sure it'll go cheap considering how much abuse has come from that range.


I'm sure it'll sell for a good price, it is RIPE space after all which is very limited as they don't give anymore than a /22 to new members and probably require a lot of justification or simply say no to current members. Just takes time to clean it (few months+) but at the end value would increase instantly as time passes on and assignments through RIPE become even more rare.


----------



## Francisco

INIZ said:


> I'm sure it'll sell for a good price, it is RIPE space after all which is very limited as they don't give anymore than a /22 to new members and probably require a lot of justification or simply say no to current members. Just takes time to clean it (few months+) but at the end value would increase instantly as time passes on and assignments through RIPE become even more rare.


Given ownership is already transferred, it's also likely that baltic took it + the customers as payment for whatever dues santrex had.

Francisco


----------



## jarland

rds100 said:


> Ok, Santrex is down the drain. When will Ecatel follow them? That would be the real good news for the internet.


Standing offer to join the rebellion. Someone start an angry mob to torch the place, I'll hop on a plane. You can quote than in NSA record.


----------



## HalfEatenPie

jarland said:


> Standing offer to join the rebellion. Someone start an angry mob to torch the place, I'll hop on a plane. You can quote than in NSA record.


Rebel Scum! The Empire shall rise again!


----------



## kro

Francisco said:


> I don't doubt they were still popular but it's likely that a lot of people didn't bother reading the email yet. Most of their locations should be going dark in the next few days so there'll likely be a big melt down over it.
> 
> 
> Francisco


Good call.

Should take some bets on the # threads that'll spawn in the coming days.


Profit can still be generated from this situation!


----------



## drmike

So is Santrex still dead?

Any update on Court action against Santrex / it's owner(s)?


----------



## Kruno

drmike said:


> So is Santrex still dead?
> 
> Any update on Court action against Santrex / it's owner(s)?


Yes, correct, still dead. The website is online, but all services have been out-of-stock for some time now.

There is no court case though. The LTD has already been liquidated. The only "case" was liquidation process which was approved, even though responsible person from Santrex didn't show up. Quite normal for UK LTD's, nothing weird there.


----------



## beast5

Good news! i cant belive it took me so long to see it


----------



## Lanarchy

Holy necrothread, Batman!


----------



## markjcc

Santrex may be dead but what about other dirty dirty hosts

cough ecatel, limehost aka voxility


----------

