Before discussing the best tricks to secure your WordPress website, we need to think about why everyone talks about the WordPress security checklist?
In our opinion, do you need to think about secure your WordPress website? Yes, indeed, WordPress is vulnerable to all sorts of hack attacks. But we shouldn’t blame WordPress. Nothing on the internet is secure.
6 Quick Steps to Secure Your WordPress Website
How to secure a WordPress website from hackers? Almost all hosting companies claim to provide an optimized environment for WordPress, but do they? It would help if you only worked with reliable, high-quality, and safe hosting. Generally, the more you pay, the better your new host will be.
define(‘DISALLOW_FILE_EDIT’, true)
With the various themes and plugins that exist there, it is not surprising that vulnerabilities exist and are continually affecting websites.
Why This How to Secure Your WordPress Website Question is Here?
If your website got hacked, it is entirely your responsibility because WordPress has just provided you’re a starting point on which you go and enhance. Today, we decided to provide your information on how to secure your WordPress website quickly and free.
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1. Keep Your WordPress Version and Plugins Up to Date
An outdated WordPress site, plugin, or theme, is a potential wide-open gateway to your website. Let’s review some WordPress stats.
- 64% of websites had an SEO spam infection in recent reports. Database spam was the most prevailing form of infection. Sometimes database infections can happen without backdoors, which may be related to SQL injections and reflective of database.
- 49% of infected websites contained one or more backdoors, allowing attackers to maintain access to compromised environments after the initial infection.
- Over 59% of all CMS applications were out of date at the point of infection found in reports.
Fortunately, we were able to use the GUI to automate things like automatic updates for themes and plugins and WordPress itself, thanks to a recent update in a major release of WordPress. Previously, you had to be somewhat tech-savvy and manually edit your wp-config.php file to add some lines of code to enable these features.
How to Enable Auto-Updates for Plugins
Basic Process: This is the easiest and most popular method for updating individual plugins. Just follow these steps, and you will be good to go.
Step 1: Log into your WordPress dashboard by going to – http://yourdomainname.com/wp-admin.
Step 2: Once you successfully log into your WordPress admin panel, visit – Plugins » Installed Plugins
Step 3: You will notice a list of plugins installed for your website. Click on the “Enable auto-updates” action link next to the plugin you want to update.
This process can be simultaneously done for multiple plugins by using a bulk action. Select the plugins you want to update, then select “Enable Auto-updates” from the drop-down. Finally, click on the “Apply” button.
2. Secure Default Login Page of WordPress
Everybody knows the Default login URL of WordPress, from where you can access the back end of your website, and the default URL is why people try to brute force your site for hacking your website. They can do this by adding wp-login.php or wp-admin at the end of your domain name, and that’s it.
We recommend you customize this to something of your own choice, and it should be something that only you know it. It is the first thing you should do to secure your WordPress website.
Below are some best solutions to secure your WordPress website checklist steps you should take to secure your site.
3. Setting up Lockdown for Your Website and Ban Unauthentic Users
Adding a lockdown feature to your website for failed login users can solve many of your problems. For example, it will avoid continuous brute force attacks.
Whenever some buddy tries to attempt a hack attack by inserting repetitive wrong passwords, your website will block that IP and send you an email informing you about the activity.
We have found out that the Wordfence security plugin is the best to secure your WordPress website job by doing some research. Many of our clients have been using this plugin for quite some time.
It offers a lot of things in this field of security. You can customize several attempts a user can make for login in, and after this, the user will get banned. If that is the authentic user, you can unblock him with just one click, so it is a great plugin you should try out. On the other hand, you can also use other plugins like iThemes Security.
4. Always Use 2-Factor Authentication for Login
Using 2-facture authentication (2FA) to log in to your website is another way to improve your website security. Once you set up 2FA for your website login, your user will be asked two things to enter. The website owner can set that. It can either be a password and security question or password and security code, etc.
We prefer to have a password and security question while deploying 2FA on our clients' websites. Below are listed some of the plugins you can use for 2-factor authentication.
- Google Authenticator – Two Factor Authentication (2FA)
- You can get this feature also in ithemes security.
5. Use Email Instead of Username for Login
By default, we have to insert a username for logging in, but you can customize that you can use email instead, which is a more secure way to log in to your website. Why email? Why not a username? This is evident because the username is easy to guess or find; unlike emails, emails are more complex whenever a WordPress account has been created with a unique email id.
Wp email login is the plugin you would love for this job, and it works out of the box for this job. You need to install the plugin, and it will start working upon activation. It works straight away. No configuration or settings are required.
6. Customizing Your Login URL
Customizing the default WordPress login URL is an easy thing to do. By default, everyone can access the WordPress login page by writing wp-admin or wp-login.php after the domain name.
When the hackers know they will indeed try to brute force your website with their own DWDb, which is the tool they used for guessing your password for each username: wp-login and password: login321 and millions or other such combinations they have stored in their Guess Work Database.
At this point, if you have used all of our suggested security tips, you have already restricted the user from login attempts. You have also swapped the username with an email, and now if you replace the default login page, you will get rid of 99.9 % of attacks.
Now here, you can again use iThemes Security for the job, install the plugin, and go to its setting from there to change your default login form.
EXAMPLES BELOW:
- Change wp-admin to something like is-admin.
- wp-login.php to something like is-login.php or something of your own choice.
- Also, change the /wp-login.php?action=register to something only you know.
7. Keep a Strong Password
Keep on changing the password of your website once a week, at least. Also, try to generate a password using a standard free password generator and keep a strong password that cannot hack easily.
8. Secure Your WordPress Website: Don’t Use Nulled Themes
Many websites provide nulled or cracked themes. A nulled or cracked item is a hacked version of a premium theme, available via illegal means. They are very dangerous for your site, so be careful.
Those themes contain hidden malicious codes and configurations, significantly damaging your site, which could destroy your website and database or steal your login admin credentials. So to secure your WordPress website, don't ever use nulled or cracked scripts.
9. Secure Your WordPress Admin Panel
The most exciting part of your WordPress website to a hacker is your admin panel, which should indeed be your website's most secure place. And for attacking and hacking, the most reliable place of the website is indeed attractive to hackers, and this is the place from where they can do a lot of damage to your site.
The best tricks to secure your WordPress website will improve the security of your WordPress dashboard.
10. Password Protect Your WP-ADMIN Directory
Everything has a heart by heart; we mean the main component or branch or thing on which the entire thing is dependent. So the core of the WordPress wp-admin directory is done with your website.
It is the place where you can get a lot of damage, so let figure out ways you can secure this place on your website to secure your WordPress website.
If, for some reason, the users of the site are allowed for some parts, you can unblock those parts of the website by just making some simple configuration.
Best Tricks to Secure Your WordPress Website
Ok, so let's figure out ways to protect the wp-admin directory. One way to preserve the index is to make a password protect that directory. If the website owner wants to access the dashboard, they have to give two passwords, one for the website and the other master password for accessing the wp-admin panel, by submitting two passwords.
You can read this article to password protect your wp-admin.
11. SSL Data Encryption
The smart move to secure your website is implementing an SSL (Secure Socket Layer) in the website. It will indeed improve your rank on google too, and it will make your website more secure.
The SSL would ensure secure data transfer between the client's and server browsers, making it nearly impossible for hackers to get hands-on data.
Setting up an SSL is not a big issue because you can request your hosting provider to enable your SSL certificates, and they will, and the good thing is that it is provided to you free of cost in most cases to secure your WordPress website.
Once they enable the SSL Certificates, you need to install this free plugin by Let’s Encrypt free open source SSL certificate. We use this for our websites as well as for our clients too.
All the excellent hosting provider uses Let’s Encrypt with their packages. As previously described, it will also rank you higher in google; you can read its complete manual by clicking here.
12. Add Users With 100% Attention
If you are running your blog by multiple people like multiple authors, write a blog for your website so that these multiple users would access your admin panel. In this situation, you are more vulnerable to security threats.
Don’t worry. You can use a plugin to ensure that your users register and log in with a strong password to secure your WordPress website.
13. Never Keep Admin as Your Username
You should never keep “ADMIN” as your administrator account to secure your WordPress website when installing WordPress. The primary key of hackers is guessing, and admin is a straightforward and approachable key for hackers.
Now they are one step away from hacking your website, which guesses your password.
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14. Keep Daily Check on Your Files
You can use Wordfence security to keep track of changes to your website. It will ensure a bit more safety to your site.
15. Secure Your Website’s Database
Your website's entire data and settings are stored in your website database. The most crucial thing is to take proper care of it. Below are some tips to take care of to ensure and secure your WordPress website.
Change Your Database Table Prefix
If you installed WordPress on your website, you might be aware of wp- table prefixes used by WordPress database table by default.
We would highly recommend changing it to something unique to secure your WordPress website because using this default table prefix makes it more open to hackers. Because they know that wp- the default table prefix. They would like to try some SQL injection with the default table prefix to get hints or helpful information about the table design and table data.
You can also use another plugin by the name of WP-DBManager for the same job.
Best Tricks to Secure Your WordPress Website
So, change it to something unique like mywp or something else of your own choice.
If WordPress is already installed on your website with the default table prefix, then, in this case, you can use the iThemes Security plugin to change your table prefix to secure your WordPress website. It's a pretty simple setting that can quickly help you do that.
Set Up a Strong Password
Use a solid password for accessing your WordPress database, the one you enter when installing WordPress. As always, use the password generator to generate your password to secure your WordPress website.
Backup Your Database Daily
No matter how much you make your website secure, there is always a way to hack in. Still, keeping yourself on the safe side is always a better choice, so take your website backup daily. If your site gets hacked, it won’t be a problem to restore. All you will do would install the backup you have taken.
WordPress doesn’t have a built-in backup option; however, some hosting providers offer their own automatic backups.
There are other third-party backup options; you can use plugins like BackupBuddy, Updraft, VaultPress, or cloud services like Amazon, Dropbox, or Stash.
16. Secure Your Websites Theme and Plugins
WordPress themes and plugins are the most crucial thing on your website. But unfortunately, they can also be the target for hackers to hack your website. Now let’s find out how to secure them to secure your WordPress website.
Update Your WordPress Themes and Plugins Regularly
As you may or may not know, every reasonable price of a software product is supported and maintained by developers. It updated concerning time like the developer try to overcome their mistakes and vulnerabilities in this software product.
So, updating your themes and plugins can save you from a lot of trouble because the hackers know that many people don’t take time to update their themes and plugins, so they will indeed target you through previous versions of software loopholes.
Hide Your WordPress Version Number
The current version number of your WordPress can quickly be found because it sits next to your source.
So it is always better to hide because if the hacker knows what version you are using, it's pretty easy to prepare the perfect attack to target and hack your website.
Hiding WordPress Version Number With Single Click
WP Hardening by Astra Security is a tool that performs a real-time security audit of your website to find missing security best practices. Using ‘Security Fixer,’ you can fix WordPress problems with a single click from your WordPress backend.
- Install the WP-Hardening plugin.
- Activate it.
- Now, navigate to the ‘Security Fixers‘ tab.
WP Hardening is a one-stop solution to implement security recommendations for your WordPress website. It is effortless to use and works efficiently from your WordPress backend.
By Editing Generator Meta Tag
If you are confident of your coding skills, you can remove the WordPress number manually from the generator meta tag:
- Go to the WordPress themes directory. It can be found in /wp-content/themes/
- Add the following line of code at the bottom of the activated WordPress theme’s file functions.php.
remove_action('wp_head', 'wp_generator')To hide the version number from the website and to remove the version number from RSS feeds, add the following code to functions.php file:
function remove_version_info() {
return '';
}
add_filter('the_generator', 'remove_version_info');Note: Do not make any changes if you are not entirely sure about its function and utility.
17. Secure Your Hosting
Every hosting company promises to provide the best, but there is always room for improvement lets see them step by step.
WP-CONFIG File Protection
Well, WP-CONFIG is the file that holds all of your passwords and details about your site like your database name and user name, etc., which is crucial data concerning your website security. WP-CONFIG is the heart of WordPress. If somebody gets access to this, he can do whatever he wants with your website.
When the WP-CONFIG file is inaccessible to the hacker, it's hard to hack a WordPress website, and the good news is that it's straightforward to do so.
Best Tricks to Secure Your WordPress Website
All you have to do is change your wp-config file's directory, which means move it to one index higher and done. The question is, how will the server know that we have moved the config file one step higher? The WordPress routing engine is made to search all of the directories to find its core file, so it won't be a problem for WordPress to find the config file.
Disable File Editing
If you have given multiple users admin access, then, in this case, all of your administrators can access your website theme and plugin's core file.
However, if you disable this feature, a hacker cannot amend your WordPress core file if he gains admin access to your website. To do this, go to your Cpanel and in your WordPress directory, find the wp-config file, and add the below-given line in it, and you are done.
| 1. | define(‘DISALLOW_FILE_EDIT', true); |
Setup Your File Access Role Properly
If you have used shared hosting, then having the wrong file access permission can lead to a severe problem; in this situation, setting up the proper directory and file permission can secure your website.
If you are willing to protect your website at the hosting level, you can set your directory permission to “755” and file to “644” to protect your whole site at the hosting level. Like by doing this, your directories, subdirectories, and individual file are all secure.
You can read the WordPress codex to understand everything about the file system for the WordPress website for more info.
Best Tricks to Secure Your WordPress Website
It can be done using your file system in your hosting, or you can do this manually from the terminal using the chmod command.
Using .htaccess to Disable The Directory Listings
Suppose that you create a directory on your server or hosting by the name of “Website,” and you don’t add index.html, then you would be surprised that your visitor can access all of the listings of that directory by just visiting the link like “demo.com/website.” For this, they don’t even need a password.
You can stop this by adding the below-given code to your .htaccess file.
| 1. | Options All -Indexes |
18. Block all Hotlinking
If you’re trying to secure your WordPress website, disable hotlinking. Hotlinking is basically another person taking your photo and stealing your server bandwidth to show the image on their own website. In the end, you’ll see slower loading speeds and the potential for high server costs.
The easiest method is to find a WordPress security plugin for the job. For instance, the All in One WP Security and Firewall plugin includes built-in tools for blocking all hotlinking.
FAQ About WordPress Security – Secure Your Site from Hackers
-
Why is your site security so important?
Hackers can steal user information, passwords, install malicious software, and even distribute malware to users. They might even hijack your website, and the only way to get it back is ransom.
-
Is WordPress secure?
Nothing on the internet is secure. WordPress keeps the core updated and safe, but not all WordPress sites run the latest version.
-
Why use the latest PHP version?
If you are on a WordPress host that uses cPanel, you can switch between PHP versions by clicking on “PHP Select” under the software category.
-
How to improve security in WordPress?
1. Keeping Your Site Updated.
2. Using Secure Admin Login Credentials.
3. Enabling Two-Factor Authentication.
4. Disabling PHP Error Reporting.
5. Changing PHP Settings Using the Control Panel.
Conclusion – Secure Your WordPress Website
Your WordPress site is both your business and income for many of you, so it’s essential to take some time and implement some of the security best practices to secure your WordPress website.
We only provided those tricks to secure your WordPress website, which we find helpful to secure WordPress. Please feel free to inform us via the comment box if you think we have missed something. We are looking forward to your valuable comments.
