Imagine waking up one morning to discover that your cloud provider has deleted your entire account – ten years of work, backups, and infrastructure – without warning, without appeal, and without a trace left behind.
That’s exactly what happened to one developer in July 2025, when AWS permanently deleted his 10-year-old account due to a billing verification issue – wiping out every byte of his data, despite years of secure practices and backups replicated across regions.
This isn’t just a personal horror story. It’s a wake-up call for anyone who trusts third-party cloud providers to safeguard their work, especially developers and teams who rely on platforms like AWS, Google Cloud, or Azure as critical components of their infrastructure.
At UltimateWB, we believe in building websites and systems with control and accountability – not blind trust in a faceless provider.
The Story in Brief
The developer had done everything right:
- Backups in multiple AWS regions
- Encryption keys stored separately
- A long history of good payment behavior
- Open-source contributions used across the web
But when a third-party payer tied to the account failed a verification check – and AWS’s support team failed to respond promptly – the account was suspended. Instead of freezing access and offering recovery options (as AWS policy claims to do), AWS immediately deleted all infrastructure and data.
For 20 days, support gave vague, templated responses. Eventually, they admitted the account was gone – permanently.
Redundancy Isn’t Enough
This case highlights a critical truth: Redundancy doesn’t protect you from the provider itself.
You can have multi-region backups, multi-factor authentication, and a carefully planned architecture – but if the platform you’re using decides to terminate your account, your entire digital world can vanish in seconds.
Support Theater and Policy Gray Zones
AWS claims accounts are retained for 90 days after closure. But the fine print? That only applies to voluntary closures. If your account is suspended for “verification failure,” it may be deleted immediately – even if you’ve done nothing wrong, and even if you’re trying to resolve the issue.
Support? You’re often stuck with low-level agents copying and pasting scripted replies, unable to escalate, clarify, or act. That’s not support – that’s support theater.
What This Means for Developers, Freelancers, and Agencies
If you’re running a business, maintaining client websites, or managing important data in the cloud, this is more than a cautionary tale – it’s a systemic risk. Here’s what you can take away:
✅ Don’t assume your cloud provider has your back.
✅ Have a backup plan – and back up your backups.
✅ Document everything.
✅ Don’t rely on support to rescue you when things go wrong.
And perhaps most importantly:
✅ Build on a platform that gives you control.
Why We Built UltimateWB Differently
UltimateWB isn’t just another website builder. It’s a platform that gives you full control over your files, hosting, data, and backups.
When you use UltimateWB:
- You choose your own hosting or use ours (blazing speeds with lots of perks!) – but you always have access to your files when you buy this downloadable website builder.
- You control the database – and can back it up whenever you want.
- You can export your full site anytime. You’re never locked in.
- There’s no “suspended account = immediate deletion” policy. We communicate with you.
That’s the difference between building on a cloud service designed for scale vs. one designed for trust and transparency.
You Are Not Disposable
Big cloud providers run on metrics. If their machine learning models or account systems flag you as low priority, suspicious, or unprofitable, you may find yourself on the wrong side of an automated decision – with no warning and no recourse.
At UltimateWB, we’re a small team with a different philosophy: you are not just a data point.
We’ve worked with developers, entrepreneurs, artists, and businesses of all sizes – and we know that the work you create online matters. We treat it that way.
Plan Accordingly
Here’s what we recommend going forward, no matter what platform you use:
- Always keep local backups of your website files and databases.
- Use a provider that gives you real support and real control.
- Avoid being overly dependent on a single provider – especially for mission-critical systems.
- Don’t assume “big names” mean better protection. The opposite is often true.
Final Thoughts
The cloud can be powerful. But it’s not your friend. It’s a business.
If AWS can delete a 10-year-old account with zero warning, what’s stopping them from doing it to you?
Build smarter. Build safer. Build on your terms.
Build with UltimateWB.
Ready to design & build your own website and build all that organic traffic? Learn more about UltimateWB! We also offer web design packages if you would like your website designed and built for you.
Got a techy/website question? Whether it’s about UltimateWB or another website builder, web hosting, or other aspects of websites, just send in your question in the “Ask David!” form. We will email you when the answer is posted on the UltimateWB “Ask David!” section.