If you’re running a website on WordPress, it’s important to focus on security. WordPress sites are especially vulnerable to attack, so it’s important to take steps to protect your site.
Although WordPress is quite secure, it is open-source which means it is susceptible to various critical vulnerabilities. Fortunately, it is easy to make WordPress secure by taking the necessary precautions.
This article discusses the most common and dangerous security vulnerabilities of WordPress and how to manage a safe and secure WordPress website.
Why You Need WordPress Security
There are several reasons why WordPress websites prioritize security. This is especially true for businesses that want to maintain a good reputation and remain competitive in their industry. By ensuring that their website is secure, businesses can avoid data breaches, hacking attacks, and other security threats.
It protects your information and reputation.
If attackers are able to get personal information about you or your website’s visitors, they could do a lot of damage with it. Security breaches could lead to data leaks, identity theft, ransomware, servers crashing, and a lot of other problems. Obviously, any of these events would be very bad for your business, and they would waste a lot of time, money, and energy.
Your visitors expect it.
The more successful your business becomes, the more issues you will need to solve, and the higher your customers’ expectations will be for how you handle those issues. One problem you will need to address is keeping your customers’ information secure. If you cannot provide this basic service from the start, it will damage your customers’ trust in you.
It is important that your customers trust that their information will be used and stored safely. If your security measures are effective, your customers will never need to know about them. If they ever do see news about your site’s security, it is likely to be negative and they may not return.
Google likes secure websites.
Making sure your WordPress website is secure is important for keeping your website ranking high.
This is because a safe website is more likely to be indexed by search engines. Website security has been a factor in search engine rankings for some time. Improving security is one of the easiest ways to improve your ranking. You can find out more about what other factors affect how search engines rank your website in our Ultimate Guide to Google Ranking Factors.
It is important to make sure your website is secure in order to protect your visitors and users. Here are some steps to help you do this:
WordPress Security Issues
If someone chooses not to do anything to secure their WordPress site, bad things could happen. The most common types of cyberattacks on WordPress websites are:
Brute-Force Login Attempts
This occurs when attackers use automation to enter many username-password combinations very quickly, eventually guessing the right credentials.
Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)
Cross Site Scripting (XSS) attacks occur when an attacker inserts malicious code into the backend of a target website to steal information or disrupt the site’s functionality. This code can be inserted into the backend by more complex means, or simply submitted as a response in a user-facing form.
Database Injections
An SQL injection happens when an attacker submits a string of harmful code to a website. The website then stores the code on its database and the code runs on the website, fetching or compromising confidential information stored in the database.
Backdoors
In computing, a backdoor is a method, often secret, of bypassing normal authentication in a product, computer system, cryptographic protocol or component that is otherwise difficult to access. A backdoor is a file that contains code that allows an attacker to bypass the standard WordPress login and access your site at any time. Attackers often place backdoors among other WordPress source files, making them difficult to find by inexperienced users. Even when removed, attackers can write variants of this backdoor and continue using them to bypass your login.
Denial-of-Service (DoS) Attacks
This text is discussing denial-of-service (DoS) attacks. DoS attacks are carried out by flooding a server with traffic, causing it to crash. A distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack is a DoS attack conducted by many machines at once, and is even more devastating.
Phishing
This is known as phishing. Phishing is when an attacker contacts a target posing as a legitimate company or service. Phishing attempts typically prompt the target to give up personal information, download malware, or visit a dangerous website. If an attacker accesses your WordPress account, they could even coordinate phishing attacks on your customers while posing as you.
Hotlinking
When hotlinking occurs, another website is displaying content from your website without permission. Hotlinking is usually illegal and can cause serious issues for the victim, who has to pay every time the content is displayed on another website.
For these crimes to occur, hackers need to discover holes in a site’s security. Common vulnerabilities that hackers look for when targeting WordPress websites include:
- Plugins: Third-party plugins account for the majority of WordPress security breaches. Since plugins are created by third parties and have access to the backend of your website, they’re a common channel for hackers to disrupt your site’s functionality.
- Outdated WordPress versions: WordPress sometimes releases new versions of their software to patch security vulnerabilities. When fixes come out, the vulnerabilities become public knowledge, and problems with old versions of WordPress are often targeted by hackers.
- The login page: The backend login page for any WordPress website by default is the site’s main URL with “/wp-admin” or “/wp-login.php” added to the end. Attackers can easily find this page and attempt a brute force entry.
- Themes: Yes, even your WordPress theme can open your site up to cyberattacks. Outdated themes may be incompatible with the most recent version of WordPress, allowing easy access to your source files. Also, many third-party themes do not follow WordPress’ standards for code, causing compatibility issues and similar vulnerabilities.
To learn more about WordPress security threats, read our article on common WordPress security problems.
How to Harden WordPress Security
If you don’t take care of your website’s security, all your hard work will be for nothing. WordPress security is important to maintain in order to avoid negative consequences.
Although it may seem daunting, protecting your website is relatively simple if you follow the WordPress security measures listed above. By taking these precautions, you can rest assured knowing that your website is at minimal risk.
1. Backup Regularly your WordPress website
No website is completely safe from hackers, so it’s important to have a plan in place in case your WordPress site is hacked. Backups can help you quickly restore your site to its normal state after a hack.
The purpose of a backup is to have a saved copy of your website that you can revert to in case your website is hacked. How often you create backups should depend on how often you update your website’s content, with more frequent updates requiring more frequent backups.
In addition to taking multiple backups, make sure to label them with the date and time. If a hack is not discovered for days, you might need an older backup.
2. Enhance Security by Updating CMS, Plugin & Themes to Latest Versions
It is easier to secure your website by updating it regularly. Updates for the core CMS, plugins, and themes usually come with security patches and improvements. Acting quickly on these updates can greatly reduce the risk. Even the top security experts agree that keeping your website up to date eliminates most of the risks. The latest WordPress version as of February 2021 is v5.7 Beta 1.
Although a major update can improve a website, it can also break some features. For this reason, it is a good idea to take a backup before beginning an update. Once you have a backup, you can put your website into maintenance mode before starting the update.
Moreover, the WordPress core has three different types of updates:
- Core development updates, known as the “WordPress 5.7”
- Minor core updates, such as maintenance and security releases
- Major core release updates
The minor releases of WordPress are automatically updated in the backend. You only need to take care of updating the major core releases. Likewise, update the themes and plugins as well.
with a single click You can use our WP Hardening Plugin to fix 12+ issues with a single click. This will stop user enumeration, disable XMLRPC, hide version numbers, and more.
3. Remove defunct Plugins/themes
If you have not used a plugin for the longest time, you must get rid of it to secure your WordPress. This is because even though the plugin is no longer in use or is disabled, the files still exist. Further, these files might contain vulnerabilities unknown to you which attackers could exploit easily. Thus, delete the defunct plugins & themes.
Here is how you can do that:
- Log into your WordPress dashboard
- Go to the Plugins sections
- Identify the inactive plugins, and delete them.
4. Host your WordPress website on a secured server
The hosting server is responsible for the security of your WordPress website. While selecting a server you must consider the following:
- Authority
- Reviews and ratings
- Support
- Customization
- Loading time
5. Set correct user roles
Different users on your WordPress site may require different levels of access and privileges. You can assign specific roles to each user according to their responsibilities. This will help you keep better control over who does what on your site. WordPress defines six default roles, listed in order of level of access and privilege, from highest to lowest: Super administrator, administrator, Editor, Author, Contributor, and Subscriber.
The predefined user roles can be assigned from the dashboard, while custom roles would require a plugin. The User Roles Editor plugin would be the best option for this.
Here is how you can define custom user roles with this plugin:
- Install a plugin ‘User role editor”
- Go to ‘Users’>Other rolesStep
- Define/add custom roles for a particular user.
6. Update WordPress security keys
The secret security keys used to protect cookies in your WordPress website must be setup in order to discourage theft and impersonation of users. After you have set the secret security keys, all current sessions will be voided and users will be required to re-authenticate. If there is ever any suspicion that the security keys may have been compromised, it is important that the administrator changes them immediately.
You can create secret keys in two ways: manually or with an online key generator. WordPress also has an official key generator you can use. To generate keys, go to the WordPress website and follow the instructions. Then, paste the keys into the wp-config file.
7. Improve hardware protection
It is sensible to protect the computer you are using to access your website. If your PC is not secured and has vulnerabilities, it provides a way for hackers to get into your website. Make sure your device is well-protected by installing a firewall and anti-virus software. This will not only prevent WordPress attacks, but also any other online security threats.
Obsolete and defunct applications are a security risk and should be removed from your device.
Most applications will ask for different permissions as soon as you install them. Try to give them the least amount of privileges possible.
8. Scan WordPress for malware & backdoors regularly
It is just as important to monitor your website as it is to secure it. Having a proactive malware scanner that periodically scans your website is crucial for WordPress security. Checking your site periodically for viruses and malware helps keep you informed about the health of your website.
9. Alert your customers and stakeholders.
It is recommended that you reach out to your customers and inform them of the attack on your site, especially if personal information was accessed and leaked. You may receive negative responses from customers, but it is the right thing to do.
10. Consider deleting the default WordPress admin account.
If you want to make your WordPress site more secure, you can get rid of the default admin account and create a new one with the same administrator permissions. This is a good idea if you think that your original admin username and password have been compromised.
Conclusion
The security tips listed in this guide are essential for WordPress security. You must apply and maintain these on your WordPress site for enhanced security. These WordPress security tips will ensure that your website remains protected from online threats.
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