Why You Should Worry About Security
Why You Should Worry About Security
Ah, the Internet. A place for everyone to come together, build a web site and share information. However many of those building a website don’t give a second thought to the security of their website. This is a major mistake that many website operators make. As a website owner, you should be mindful of the security risks your website presents to visitors.
In this article we’ll look at a few things related to website security.
Myth #1 – WordPress is insecure
This is a very common myth that exists today. Why might people say this about WordPress? The answer is surprising simple. Since WordPress powers so many of the top websites, it’s targeted much more often than other platforms. This means that a zero day bug in the core code, or one of the many available plugins could cause a problem.
The truth is, there are bugs in every piece of software that is in use on the Internet. Once you realize this you will understand why there might be a bug in WordPress or one of the plugins.
Myth #2 – My site is too small to be hacked
Answer a simple question for me. Is your website on the Internet?
Of course it is! That very fact right there means that your website could be targeted by hackers. You see, hackers are not looking for the biggest sites to hack into, they are looking for the easiest. They assume that since you are a small site, you don’t have a lot of security measures in place. You have to approach your website security from that angle. They are looking for easy sites to hack, not difficult ones. Would you rather have an easy drive to work, or a difficult one? Of course you would want the easy drive, and hackers want the easy hack.
Myth #3 – I don’t have anything hackers would want
Suppose for a moment that you do not record any visitor information. You don’t store cookies, security logs, access logs or anything that could be used to identify your visitors. This means that you have nothing to offer a hacker, right?
Wrong! If you have people visiting your website, you have what a hacker would want. Targets.
You see a hacker is looking to inflict as much damage as possible, presumably to make money. To do this they need to get their malware onto the devices of as many people as possible. Some of these scripts that hackers write can be very dangerous. Some of these scripts have keyloggers, which allow the hacker to get access to usernames and passwords. Of course if they get a banking login, they could wipe out an account of YOUR customer. Since your site could end up on the Internet blacklists, people may not be able to get to your site, resulting in the loss of visitors to your site.
How to Protect Yourself
There are many steps you can take to protect your WordPress website. Never install a plugin unless you’ve obtained it from the WordPress directory. While this step isn’t foolproof, it does dramatically improve your odds that you are getting a quality product. However, one of the most important things you can do is use a quality security plugin to help you watch your site.
At Synchronized Hosting we recommend iThemes Security. In fact all of our hosting customers get access to this world class plugin as part of their service. This allows them to worry about their business, and not spend time worrying about if their website is secure or taken care of.
If you would like to take advantage of our hosting services, please contact us today to get started.
If you just want to get security for your own WordPress website, then you can purchase iThemes Security here.