cPanel data collection
I was looking at data collection policies from cPanel : https://docs.cpanel.net/knowledge-base/cpanel-product/cpanel-analytics-the-data-we-use/
They collect panel use analytics and there's a config option to opt out of some of it, but another set of data "Configuration Analytics" you cant opt out of.
Included in the data you cant opt out of is:
domain: The name of the domain
traffic: The per‑country traffic statistics for the domain.
sent_emails: The number of email messages that the server sent from the domain.
delivered_emails: The number of email messages that the server delivered to local mailboxes on the domain.
This is for each domain configured on the server, not just the overall server host name.
They say elsewhere that "We have taken precautions to ensure that the data we collect is secure and does not contain private, personal, or security information." I think that means they don't consider the traffic data of the domains personal data and I agree given that it's not data about any individual . My understanding is that would mean there's no legal protection for what they do with that data
I can't see the need for the domain names much less with per‑country traffic statistics for improving cPanel.
I think that daily data feed for probably an 8 figure number of domains would have significant commercial value.
I can imagine that many businesses hosting on cPanel would not be happy to know that kind of data about their website was potentially being sold without their knowledge. Maybe it's finding its way to sites like similarweb and their competitors are accessing it. Who knows?