Hello, I sign up at hostgator for hosting and domain. I add my cc info's and after some minutes I god one e-mail: Hello, Thank you for your order with HostGator.com! In order for us to setup your account, we will need you to call us and verify your account. If you are unable to call us, you can also respond to this ticket with a scanned copy of a Photo ID such as a passport or drivers license. In addition to a photo ID, please include a scanned copy of the credit card that was used in your account purchase (assuming you purchased a hosting account with a credit card). For security purposes, you can mask off all the digits of the card number except for the last 4 digits. Please provide us with the above requested information at your earliest convenience to ensure that your account with HostGator is setup as soon as possible. We apologize for any inconveniences that may result from this process. This extra verification is done for your security and is done to ensure that your order is not fraudulent. The web hosting industry unfortunately has a high rate of fraudulent orders and this sort of verification helps us drastically reduce fraud and help ensure our customers remain secure. This is a one time process and will not be something you will have to do in the future. We are available to help you 24/7, so please feel free to call us at your convenience. Here are our phone numbers: Toll-free: 1-866-96-GATOR, and then dial extension 1010 International: +001 713-574-5287 If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, please don't hesitate to contact us.Thank you Best regards, Hayley F. New and Pending Accounts HostGator.com LLC http://support.hostgator.com Your feedback is important to us. Please take a moment to rate this response. Upon doing so, you will be entered to win a $25 credit towards your HostGator account. http://tickets.hostgator.com/rateticket/26042157/636/1261169818/3c2c57901783b68c36b4051900e42097 To reply to this ticket, please be sure to email 12844657@tickets.hostgator.com from the email address you created the ticket with. Code (markup): Now what can I do to activate my account? I don't wanna call, Can I take a photo of my credit card and send to hostgator? Thanks. Sorry for my stupid languange.
According to the message, you will need to scan and send some photo ID too. Hostgator are a large company and they can be trusted to deal with anything you send in an appropriate manner. These security measures are being taken by more and more companies, so you'll start to come accross this more often.
We do the same thing for anyone that fails our fraud detection system. So it's pretty safe, I doubt they'll use your info for anything other than verification.
there is no choice, you have to call hostgator support to get account verified and activated. not to send credit card photo or info over email, its not https and its not secure.
It is already stated in the email that you've received : If you are unable to call us, you can also respond to this ticket with a scanned copy of a Photo ID such as a passport or drivers license. In addition to a photo ID, please include a scanned copy of the credit card that was used in your account purchase (assuming you purchased a hosting account with a credit card). For security purposes, you can mask off all the digits of the card number except for the last 4 digits. - Dynashox -
Not everyone can afford the calling them. And I agree you can reply to the ticket with required info. It seems the only possible way to go ahead