The Ultimate Security Guide for Your WordPress Site in 2024
Are you doing everything that is necessary to keep your site secure?
Remember, Security is one of the most important factors when it comes to a site, whether you are using WordPress or not. It is so crucial that even your whole business may depend on it. When there are problems with your site's security, it's natural that users will avoid your site.
Ultimately, you will lose valuable customers and it will result in decreased sales.
Besides that, unauthorized people may take advantage of your information while your site's security is vulnerable. So, you need to be extra careful when we are talking about any kind of breaches that might happen.
We already discussed Top WordPress Security plugins that may improve your site. Today we will guide you through the process of making WordPress security strong for your website.
Security Issues within Your WordPress Site
WordPress is an open-source platform and the community is very strong. Being open source, WordPress allows any individual to access the core codes. There is a high chance that anyone can modify it. Isn’t this information enough to scare you off?
Well, think again! Why almost 42% of the world's websites, which is almost 60 Million, are using WordPress?
The answer is simple.
While someone is trying to break the code, more than double people are voluntarily detecting those and fixing the bugs in the core code.
This makes WordPress almost risk-free and reliable.
WordPress Security Guide – 11 Tips to Keep Your Site Secure
WordPress is the most popular and largest CMS out there. It is true that – it's highly secure, robust and also flexible in many ways. With some simple and easy do-it-yourself (DIY) tricks, you can make your site 100% secure and prevent any kind of breaches.
Let's find out then what this WordPress security guide has to offer. Here are the 11 tips that we are going to discuss today:
- Use Different and Strong Passwords
- Make Admin and Other Usernames Unpredictable
- Update Your Site and Plugins Regularly
- Find A Strong Hosting
- Make Good Use of SSL
- Add A Firewall To WordPress
- A Regular Backup can Save Your Anytime
- Limit Login Attempts
- Don't Forget about Access Roles
- Preventing SQL Injection
- Authentication Keys
Now let's get into the details!
01. Use Different and Strong Passwords
Cracking your password is not that difficult. A hacker does not use wild guesses to do so. They gather enough information about you that can be later turned into readable data by hack-tools. And if you have multiple accounts synced together, the task gets easier.
It is wise to never use the same password for two accounts. Use different passwords for your website database, hosting server, admin panel, FTP accounts, and connected email accounts. It is better to use long passwords made of both numbers and alphabets.
02. Make Admin and Other Usernames Unpredictable
Using a unique username you can enhance your website's security. When you have a simple username, potential attackers are more likely to guess the right one. However, a long username is more difficult to guess.
Also, you should always use different usernames for different accounts. This way, hacking into one of your accounts will not disclose the usernames of your other accounts.
03. Update Your Site and Plugins Regularly
There is a reason companies have a dedicated team to introduce new or fix existing features. Developers and hackers are in a never-ending battle. And every once in a while, hackers figure out a loophole that can be exploited.
The developers then try to fix the flaw by writing new codes. Which puts the hackers searching for another flaw that is still undetected.
Regularly update your WordPress version, themes, and all the plugins from the official website. Monitor the PHP version you are using. It should automatically update with your WordPress.
04. Find A Strong Hosting
A web-hosting provider acts as a home to your website. There are many hosting providers. Choose the one that has automatic WordPress updates and backup facilities. And if you are using a Payment Gateway such as Stripe or PayPal, make sure the servers meet the PCI Compliance requirements.
Ideally, a good web host provider is home to thousands of websites. And if one website gets infected on that host, it is quite possible the remaining websites will also be similarly affected by it. Look if it has the capacity to isolate an infected website before starting the patching phase.
05. Make Good Use of SSL
SSL Secure Sockets Layer is a digital certificate that facilitates the establishment of a secure connection between the server and users. This is mandatory for any website receiving sensitive user information such as credit card details. Many web-hosting providers include an SSL certificate in their package.
06. Add A Firewall To WordPress
By using a firewall on your WordPress installation, you ensure some very common exploits are no longer possible. These issues include things like Brute Force attacks or denial of service attacks.
What’s more, firewalls can block IP addresses of people who are continuously trying to breach your site. This not only keeps your site secure but increases its performance as well. And most WordPress firewalls come pre-loaded with the IP addresses of known hackers that become automatically blocked when the firewall is installed.
07. A Regular Backup can Save Your Anytime
You might say backing up your website is not efficient as you need to pay double for maintenance. But there are people who feel comfortable backing up their websites multiple times at different locations. Backup is required for the sheer nature of websites at present.
Modern websites have to deal with sensitive information to deliver their services. And partial or complete data loss puts the website in jeopardy.
The first thing you want to do after experiencing an attack is to restore your website to its previous stage and recreate the content. But how can you do that if you do not have any backup files? Can you imagine how long it will take you to build your website from the ground again?
You can avoid such an event by using hosts that provide backup support. One.com stores its backups in a different location. It makes sure the backup files are accessible at any time.
08. Limit Login Attempts
Your website can identify forceful login attempts made by bots. You can solve this problem by setting a limit to the number of login attempts before the IP address is blocked from making further requests.
09. Don't Forget about Access Roles
By limiting the actions a certain individual is authorized to take, you can enhance your website security. You can specify certain tasks that you expect from individuals and give them access to only the portion of the data necessary to complete the task. You can define roles on the grounds of authority, responsibility, and competency.
Related: How to create custom roles for your site?
10. Preventing SQL Injection
Using this technique, attackers get access to your database. You can use this technique to bypass the authentication step of requests to use the data server. Attackers can easily copy all the data from the database.
You can avoid this problem by using a strong username and password. You should also change the table prefix name.
11. Authentication Keys
WordPress uses cookies to verify the identity of logged-in user by analyzing the stored data on the browser. To make this information hard to break into, WordPress uses keys and salts in the wp-config.php file. These keys and salts encrypt your password and store them.
Bonus: 5 Things That Don’t Work To Keep Your WordPress Site Secure
I) Expecting Your Web Host To Handle Security
While your host does perform some basic security steps, they may not be doing everything. This largely depends on the quality and cost of your hosting platform.
You shouldn't make the mistake of expecting your host to perform everything that is required to keep your WordPress site safe and secure.
II) Doing Backups Manually & Keeping Them Locally
While having a backup is great, relying on yourself to manually do it can be a huge pitfall. Even if you are diligent in the beginning, sooner or later you will forget or miss a backup.
What’s more, if you store the backups on the same server your WordPress site is hosted on, in the event that your site is hacked your backups can be compromised or destroyed also.
III) Keeping Your Passwords Written Down Both Physically & Digitally
Not keeping your password secure can be a great way to have your website hacked. And a common way that your password will be leaked is by having it written down either in person or in a document online or on your computer.
Often times when hackers or malicious actors are breaking into computers or online accounts, passwords and logins are what they are looking for.
IV) Using An Easy To Guess Password
The easier the password, the easier it will be for hackers or malicious actors to use software programs to guess it. A brute force attack is the most common way a site will be hacked or compromised.
What is a brute force attack? It’s when someone uses a software program to try hundreds or thousands of passwords that are the most commonly used around the world.
So that means if your password is something simple like “banana,” the software program will be able to guess it very easily.
V) Installing Themes and Plugins from Untrustworthy Sources
When you install a theme or plugin from an untrusted source, you have no way of knowing if there is a backdoor pre-installed or if the plugin or theme is secure. So a great way to avoid this is ensuring that whatever themes or plugins you are using are from a trusted source like the default WordPress plugin and theme directory.
When plugins or themes are added to the WordPress directory, they undergo mandatory checks to ensure they are secure. So if you rely on the WordPress directory, you can almost guarantee the plugin will have at least go through some basic security checks
Wrapping up the WordPress Security Guide
Apart from the above techniques, there are many other ways you can make your website secure. However, if you only follow these steps and use a reputed firewall and security plugin, that would be enough.
Please remember, using a firewall is important. You can find a strong hosting which has firewall built-in. So, why are you waiting for? Take advantage of this article and follow the above steps. Make your site's security stronger than ever using this ultimate WordPress security guide.
Don't forget to share your opinion in the comments below.
