Is your WordPress website safe?
Are your customers’ and visitors’ passwords, credit cards and personal information safe from the increasing number of cyber security attacks? It’s up to you to make your website more secure.
In this article, learn why security is important and what you can do to protect your WordPress site.
Why WordPress Security Matters
It is estimated that over 86 billion password attack attempts will be blocked in the first half of 2021 and an average of 30,000 new websites hacked every day.
Hackers and various types of malware are constantly trying to access websites and their sensitive data.
What’s the result?
We are currently witnessing an unprecedented number of cyber security attacks.
This issue affects businesses of all sizes, including yours.
In fact, today 43% of online attacks target small and medium-sized businesses, of which only 14% are prepared to defend themselves.
Many hackers target large companies for greater profits.
Small businesses, however, are easy targets for hackers due to their lack of resources and security expertise.
Attacks are always unexpected. If you’re not actively monitoring your WordPress security, it’s difficult to quickly recover from a situation like this.
Fortunately, there are many steps you can take to secure your WordPress site.
Start With These Simple Security Basics
When setting up security for your WordPress site, there are some basic things you can do to increase your protection.
Here are some things you should implement first to secure your website.
- Implementing SSL Certificates
Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificates are an industry standard used by millions of websites to secure online transactions with their customers.
Getting one is one of the first steps in securing your website.
SSL certificates can be purchased, but most hosting providers offer them for free.
Then use the plugin to force an HTTPS redirect and enable an encrypted connection.
This standard technology establishes an encrypted connection between a web server (host) and a web browser (client).
Adding this encrypted connection ensures that all data transferred between them remains private and essential.
- Requiring and Using Strong Passwords
Similar to purchasing an SSL certificate, the first way to secure your website is to use and require strong passwords for all logins.
It may be tempting to use or reuse passwords that are known or easy to remember, but doing so puts you, your users, and your site at risk.
Improving password strength and security reduces the risk of hacking.
The more secure your password is, the less likely you are to fall victim to a cyberattack.
You should follow general password best practices when creating passwords.
If you’re not sure you’re using a strong enough password, check it out with a free tool like this handy password strength checker.
- Install security plugin
. WordPress plugins are a great way to quickly add useful features to your site, and there are some great security plugins available.
Installing a security plugin is an easy way to add a few extra layers of protection to your website.
First, check out this list of recommended WordPress security plugins.
Wordfence Security – Firewall & Malware Scan
All-in-one WP Security & Firewall
iThemes Security
Jetpack – WP Security, Backup, Speed, Extension
- Keep Your WordPress Core Files Up-to-Date
Keeping WordPress up-to-date is essential to maintaining the security and stability of your website.
Whenever a WordPress vulnerability is reported, the core team will start releasing updates to fix the issue.
If you do not update your WordPress site, you may be using a version of WordPress with known vulnerabilities.
It is estimated that by 2021 there will be a total of 1.3 billion websites on the web, of which over 455 million will use WordPress.
WordPress’s popularity has made it a prime target for hackers, malicious code distributors, and data thieves.
Don’t risk being attacked by using an outdated version of WordPress. Turn on automatic updates and forget about it.
If you want to manage your updates even easier, consider a managed WordPress hosting solution with automatic updates built-in.
- Take care of your themes and plugins
Keeping WordPress up to date ensures that your core files are in control. However, WordPress has other areas of vulnerability, such as themes and plugins, that may not be protected by core updates.
First, only install plugins and themes from trusted developers.
If a plugin or theme is not developed by a trusted source, it is safer not to use it.
Also make sure to update your WordPress plugins and themes.
Just like using an older version of WordPress, using outdated plugins and themes makes your site more vulnerable to attacks.
- Back Up Frequently
One way to protect your WordPress website is to keep your website and important files up-to-date.
You don’t want something to happen to your website and you don’t have a backup.
Make frequent backups of your website.
That way, if something goes wrong with your website, you can quickly roll back to the previous version and get it up and running faster.
Moderate Security Measures to Provide More Protection
If you have completed all the basic measures, but want to protect your website even more, here are some more advanced steps you can take to increase your security. there is
- Never use the username “Admin”.
“admin” is a very common username, so it’s easy to guess, making it very easy for scammers to trick users into giving up their credentials.
Never use the username ‘admin’.
This leaves you vulnerable to brute force attacks and social engineering scams.
Like strong passwords, using unique usernames for logins is a good idea because it makes it much harder for hackers to crack your login information.
If you are currently using the username ‘admin’, please change your WordPress admin username.
- Hide WP admin login page
By default most WordPress login pages are accessed by adding “/wp-admin” or “/wp-login.php” to the end of the URL. can.
This makes it easier for hackers to break into her website.
Hackers and scammers can attempt to guess usernames and passwords to access the administrator dashboard once they identify the login page.
Hiding the WordPress login page is a good way to avoid being an easy target.
Use a plugin like WPS Hide Login to hide the WordPress admin login page and protect your login credentials.
- Disable XML-RPC
WordPress uses an implementation of the XML-RPC protocol to extend functionality to software clients.
This remote procedure call protocol allows commands to be executed using data returned in XML format.
Although most users do not need the WordPress XML RPC functionality, this is one of the most common vulnerabilities that users can exploit.
It is therefore recommended to disable it.
Easy thanks to the Wordfence Security plugin.
- Harden the wp-config.php file
WordPress The wp-config.php file contains highly sensitive information about your WordPress installation, such as WordPress security keys and WordPress database connection details. We want to make this easily accessible.
You can “harden” your website by securing your wp-config.php file via a .htaccess file.
This basically means making your website more secure from hackers.
- Run a security scanning tool
Your WordPress website may have vulnerabilities you didn’t know existed.
We recommend using tools that can find and fix vulnerabilities.
The WPScan plugin scans WordPress core files, plugins and themes for known vulnerabilities.
The plugin also notifies you by email when new security vulnerabilities are found.
Increase Server-Side Security
All of the above measures have now been taken to secure your website.
However, you may also want to know what else you can do to make your security as secure as possible.
Any remaining measures that can be taken to increase security should be done on the server side of the website.
- Find a Hosting Company That Does
When you’re looking for a hosting company, you want to find one that’s fast, reliable, secure, and supports you with great customer service.
This means you need to have good, strong resources, maintain at least 99.5% uptime, and employ a server-level security strategy.
If a host can’t check these basic boxes, it’s not worth the time or money.
One of the best things you can do to secure your website from the start is to choose the right hosting company to host your WordPress website.
- Use the latest PHP version
Like older versions of WordPress, older versions of PHP are no longer safe to use.
If you do not have the latest PHP version, please update your PHP version to protect against attacks.
- Hosting on Fully Isolated Servers
Private Cloud Servers have many advantages.
One of these benefits is increased security.
Every cloud environment requires a strong combination of antivirus and firewall protection, but private his clouds run on specific physical machines, making it easier to ensure physical security.
In addition to security, a fully isolated server also offers benefits such as very high uptime and easy integration with managed hosting.
Looking for the perfect cloud environment for your WordPress website?
Look no further.
InMotion Hosting’s managed WordPress hosting gives you server-to-server migration, more secure upgrades, instant security patches, and industry-leading speed all in one.
- Use a Web Application Firewall
One of the last resorts for adding extra security measures to your WordPress site is to use a Web Application Firewall (WAF).
A WAF is typically a cloud-based security system that provides another layer of protection around your website.
Think of this as a gateway to your website.
Blocks all hacking attempts and filters out DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attacks and other malicious types of traffic such as spammers.
WAFs typically require a monthly subscription fee, but are worth the addition if you care about the security of your WordPress site.
Make sure your website and business are safe.
If your website is insecure, you may be exposed to a world of infringement.
Luckily, securing a WordPress site doesn’t require a lot of technical knowledge, as long as you have the right tools for your needs and the right hosting plan.
Instead of waiting to respond to threats as soon as they appear, proactively protect your website to prevent security problems.
This way, even if someone targets your website, you can reduce the risk and go about your business as usual without having to check your latest backup.
Get secure and fully isolated WordPress hosting with free SSL, dedicated IP address, free backups, automatic WordPress updates, DDoS protection and WAF.
