Securing Your WordPress Website: A Comprehensive Guide

With more than 43% of all websites using WordPress, this popular platform sits comfortably at the top of the table — its nearest competitors struggle to capture a tenth of the market share that WordPress commands.

The result? Many design and development professionals use WordPress for both their own sites and those of their clients. The challenge? With so many WordPress sites online, they’re often the targets of cyberattacks.

These cyberattacks range from the familiar to the fantastic. For example, simple phishing attacks remain a popular choice because even a single click-through or downloaded file can lead to compromise. More in-depth ransomware attacks, meanwhile, can lead to dreaded “triple extortion” scenarios that see companies threatened with data being duplicated offsite, destroyed on-site, and sold to the highest bidder if they don’t pay up.

Here’s what you need to know about boosting site safety and frustrating attacker efforts.

Seven Practices to Secure Your WordPress Website

While every WordPress site is different — some are used as informational blogs, others function as e-commerce storefronts, and some fill the role of business homepages — security practices remain consistent.

Start with these seven practices to reduce security risk.

1. Use SSL certificates

   Secure sockets layer (SSL) certificates create an encrypted connection between web servers and browsers. These connections help ensure that transmitted data is safe from eavesdropping or theft. With these certificates now standard security practice, sites can’t afford to skip SSL.

2. Require strong passwords

   User access is a key compromise point for WordPress websites. If malicious actors can obtain user credentials or use brute force to crack username and password combinations, they may gain complete access to WordPress deployments.

   Strong passwords help reduce this risk. Best practices for password creation include passwords that are 8 or more characters long, contain a mix of letters, numbers, and symbols, and that are changed every 4 to 6 months.

3. Implement security plugins

   WordPress offers a host of security plugins to help site owners keep their data safe. From firewalls to malware and email security, it’s worth taking a look at the official WordPress plugins website.

4. Keep installations up to date

   As the world’s leading CMS, WordPress is regularly updated with new functions, features, and security patches. Leaving deployments out-of-date puts companies at risk of security breaches. This is because when weak points are discovered, WordPress teams work quickly to find solutions and create patches. If organizations opt out of security updates, they could be exposing themselves to risk.

5. Install a web application firewall (WAF)

   Web application firewalls scan incoming traffic to determine if it should be allowed or blocked. Site owners can set the rules used to permit or deny traffic, along with the frequency and type of traffic notifications received.

6. Regularly back up your website

   Whether it’s in the cloud, using on-site secure storage, or leveraging physical media such as flash drives, make sure you’re regularly backing up your website.

   Consider a website that has been compromised and suffered damage to source code. With a cloud backup in place, IT teams can shut down existing site deployments and replace them with recent site images. Companies can also use off-site storage to keep critical assets safe, rather than leaving them stored on public-facing services.

7. Leverage security expertise

   Most WordPress site owners aren’t security experts — and don’t have the time or resources required to take on this role. As a result, it’s often worth tapping the security expertise of IT management consultants; experts in the field who can help businesses evaluate their current security posture, identify possible weak points, and suggest ways to improve WordPress protection.

Possible Consequences of Insecure Sites

If designers and developers fail to effectively secure sites, several consequences are possible:

• Lost data

  If attackers can gain administrative access, they can exfiltrate, encrypt, or destroy data. Exfiltrated data may be sent back to command and control servers and sold on the Dark Web, while encrypted data could be used as part of a ransomware scheme to extort money. Destroyed data leaves companies with the unenviable task of recreating and replacing this information.

• Compromised functions

  In some cases, the aim of attackers isn’t to compromise data but rather impact website operations. One common way to accomplish this goal is using what are known as distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. These attacks focus on overwhelming site access points with thousands (or millions) of resource and permission requests.

  Best-case scenario? Website performance slows down and IT teams are notified. Worst case? The entire site goes offline, leaving companies to deal with the aftermath.

• Reputation damage

  Site breaches can also lead to reputation damage. Consider a software-as-a-service (SaaS) provider that requires users to create and manage service accounts. If sites are compromised and client data is stolen, customers may choose to take their business elsewhere and warn other users about the potential risks of doing business with a company that leaves their website improperly secured.

• Regulatory penalties

  Depending on what type of data companies store on their site, they may be subject to regulatory penalties. For example, e-commerce sites that handle customer credit card data are obligated under PCI DSS regulations to actively protect this data with solutions such as encryption and practices such as user verification.

Failure to follow these regulations may result in monetary penalties or operational sanctions.

Solving for Site Security

For website design and development companies, site security goes beyond protecting in-house assets — in many cases, these businesses are tasked with securing the client sites they build.

As a result, solving for WordPress security is critical. To cultivate customer trust and reduce the risk of data compromise, companies must ensure they’re following WordPress security best practices, and regularly evaluating current security methods against evolving security threats.