According to statistics by WordPress.com, WordPress is powering more than 30% websites on the Internet. Smaller companies and e-commerce platforms select WordPress because of its simplicity. However, as the number of cybersecurity attacks keep increasing; the need to increase WordPress security has become even more prominent.
Penetration testers keep discovering WordPress security vulnerabilities in newer versions and keep finding ways of exploiting those vulnerabilities. If you are a company or e-commerce platform; protecting your WordPress website is critical. Thus, you need to protect your website from malicious attackers. Here are 8 tips to increase WordPress security.
Table Of Contents
- Choose A Secure Hosting Platform
- Install SSL Certificate
- Choose Quality Themes and Plugins
- Install a WordPress Security Plugin
- Change Your WordPress Admin Login URL
- Disable File Editing
- Update WordPress Version And Update Plugins
- Prevent Hotlinking And Save Server Resources
- Your Website Could Be The Next Target
- Are You Looking For A Reliable Company For WordPress Development?
Choose A Secure Hosting Platform
According to WP WhiteSecurity, 41% of security issues are occurred because of the hosting platform. To reduce security risks, you should choose a secure platform with active protection against common vulnerabilities.
We recommend you to select hosting providers such as BlueHost, Hostinger, and WP Engine. By choosing a quality hosting, speed of your WordPress website will improve considerably, and the site will become even more secure.
Install SSL Certificate
SSL and TLS encrypt all of the data between the user’s web browser and the webserver. Without SSL; the communication can be intercepted by hackers using man-in-the-middle attack.
SSL and TLS make it difficult for hackers to decrypt the data. SSL and TLS make your site secure and protect users. Most hosting platforms provide a free SSL certificate.
Choose Quality Themes and Plugins
You should only use plugins and themes developed by a well-known developer. Choose themes and plugins which regularly patch security holes and improve efficiency. If a plugin is not developed by a credible developer or isn’t updated, don’t opt for such plugins or themes.
Some sites offer cracked or nulled themes or plugins. These are hacked or cracked version of a paid theme. These may contain malicious code and compromise security. Only opt for high-quality themes and plugins and avoid using such cracked plugins and themes.
Install a WordPress Security Plugin
The developers have released multiple plugins to increase WordPress security. These plugins prevent attacks such as malware attacks and improve the overall security of your WordPress website.
iThemes plugin offers 30+ parameters such as security hardening, protection against common attacks, blacklist monitoring, protection against brute-force to increase the security of WordPress website. We recommend you to install one quality security plugin.
Change Your WordPress Admin Login URL
When you do a fresh installation of WordPress, the default login URL is example.com/wp-admin. The default URL is well known among hackers, they may attack WordPress website by brute-forcing.
To protect your website from such attacks, you should change the login URL of the admin panel. You can also add 2-factor authentication which asks for 6-digit code in addition to username and password.
Disable File Editing
WordPress code editor allows you to edit the code of theme and plugins. By keeping this functionality open is a bad security practice. If attackers gain access to your site, they may inject malicious code in themes and plugins. Using the iThemes Security plugin is an easy way to disable code editing.
Update WordPress Version And Update Plugins
It is a good security practice to keep your website’s WordPress version updated. The developers fix vulnerabilities, fix bugs and improve functionality with every major update.
If you keep WordPress up-to-date, you prevent hackers from exploiting known vulnerabilities. By default, WordPress automatically installs minor updates. You should also update theme and plugins because of the same reasons.
Prevent Hotlinking And Save Server Resources
Hotlinking impacts the performance of your website as anyone can embed images of your website by and display on their website. It consumes additional server resources, and your copyrighted images may get stolen.
It is essential to prevent hotlinking before it becomes an issue. To prevent hot-linking, most straightforward way is to use a Content Delivery Network. Cloudflare will also improve website page load performance and protect your site from basic attacks.
Your Website Could Be The Next Target
It is crucial to protect the digital assets of your business. You should invest more efforts in making your site secure and harder to attack. If your website isn’t secure, your website could be the next target.
We hope this article will help you increase WordPress security. We recommend you to implement our tips as most tips don’t require you to spend money. Do you feel that the points we covered will help you? Let us know in the comments section below.
Are You Looking For A Reliable Company For WordPress Development?
Working with an experienced web development company is the only way to ensure that there are no hurdles in your project. We are one of the top web app development companies in India. We also offer custom web development and native mobile app development services in India and USA.