Powering 30% of websites globally, WordPress is the most popular platform in the market. Therefore, it is mostly targeted by hackers as well. Besides being attacked by hackers, sometimes a theme can also be outdated. Due to this, it gets attacked by malware and get blacklisted as well. With an increasing number of people using WordPress, we prefer our site to be more dynamic. As a result, more dynamic means more chances of bugs and security holes. There are a lot of ways to increase the security of your WordPress website. One of the most effective methods is to use the WordPress Security Plugins.
Since there are many WordPress security plugins available with so many features and options, you might get confused about which ones to choose? You may even think “Do I really need A WordPress Security Plugin?” The definitive answer is YES! But before we go through them, let’s briefly look at some alternatives to WordPress security plugins.
Tips and Tricks for your WordPress Website Security
There are many bots and hackers geared up to maliciously attack your WordPress Websites. Here we have some important tips and tricks to consider your WordPress Security. If you are planning to keep this list untouched and unintended, you are going to end up with a broken website.
Change Username and Password
Make sure your username and password are set in place. You certainly don’t want your username to be Admin and you certainly don’t want your password to be generically set. Lock down your password. You can easily change WordPress username from Admin to something else or reset the WordPress password.
Prevent brute force attacks
By default, WordPress allows a number of login attempts on WordPress websites. This makes hackers to break into the WordPress website with ease. One of the ways to protect your WordPress website is by limiting login attempts. So there is a really cool plugin out there called Limit Login Attempts which limits numbers of login attempts of your WordPress.
Update your Themes, Plugins, and WordPress
Themes that are not used and updated become vulnerable to security breaches. They are easy ways for hackers to exploit bugs. So make sure that your WordPress core, plugins, and theme are up to date. WordPress do maintain and update regularly by default. But for major releases, you need to manually initiate the update. Click here to see how.
Choose a reliable Web Host
Reliable web host provides an improvement to your security by automatic updates to your WordPress site. There are Web Hosting providers which offer competitive rates and some may have a free domain, free SSL(Secure Sockets Layer). Web Hosting companies provide 100% uptime guarantee which is very important to keep your site up and running.
Keep your site clean
You may have themes that you wanted to try but didn’t like for some reasons and abandoned them. Themes which aren’t updated are vulnerable to security breaches and consume large disk space and increase the size during backup. To improve performance and to retain your visitors, this is the tip you can follow for your site to keep it safe and perform well.
Best WordPress Security Plugins to keep your Website Safe
These were few minor tips and trick for your WordPress website security. However, this does not fully secure your WordPress site. There are hundreds of WordPress Security Plugins providers. But, to find the right one may be a daunting task for you. That’s why today, we’ve hand-picked few of the best WordPress security plugins to protect your WordPress websites today from Hackers, bots, and haters. So let’s have a look on the list below:
1. Wordfence Security
Wordfence Security is number #1 recommended plugin for lots of good reasons. It sets up a firewall if you want to block a certain country or certain files.
Wordfence uses endpoint firewall protection powered by Threat Defense Feed. Your data won’t leak and cannot be bypassed by attackers. It also automatically scan your website to make sure that there is no malware or Trojans or anything that have been injected in your SQL. Wordfence notify you via email with updates whenever you have any security-related problems. Two factors authentication also includes in the features to avoid spams and protect your site in the most secure way.
2. iThemes Security
The iThemes Security works with common two-factor authentication to protect your sites from brute force attack. iThemes make easier to generate strong passwords for greater security. It gives you an instant notification in case security issues are discovered. Likewise, iThemes also hides important system information about your WordPress installation and monitor any unauthorized changes. If anyone tries to access via wp-login.php iThemes blacklist those IP automatically. Because of its simplicity, it’s easy to use even as a beginner.
3. Sucuri Security
This plugin does have a pro version but it’s phenomenal even when it’s free. Users can scan and run a test to be sure that their website has not been hacked right after installation. Sucuri Security comes along with Security Activity Audit Logging which audits all security-related suspicious activities.
Using engines like Norton, AVG, Sucuri labs helps to monitor blacklist and scan Malware. The new feature of Sucuri is to filter traffic by bots and human to get more accurate page view stats to your site. It also reduces server load to accelerate site’s loading time. Also, all of the great features that come with this extension are intuitive and easy to use.
4. All In One WP Security and Firewall
To prevent Brute Force Login Attacks, this plugin comes up with Login lockdown feature. It provides an overall security solution including firewall setup, IP filtering, database security, file integrity, monitoring user security and more. The All In One Wp Security and Firewall also blacklist users based on their suspicious activities through IP address.
You can backup and restore your .htaccess and wpconfig.php files as well as import or export a full set of settings for the plugin. The main dashboard indicates the current level of security. You can see the areas which need website security improvement with the latest recommended WordPress security practices and techniques. With 700,000 active installations and based on the performance, we can definitely say this one of the free and best security solutions.
5. Jetpack by WordPress.com
The makers of WordPress developed Jetpack which is a very popular plugin. It’s an extremely diverse tool. You don’t have to install multiple plugins for each of its features. So, everything is available within a single plugin.
A free version of Jetpack has spam filtering built in as well as brute force protection. Jetpack activates 2-step authentication which can greatly enhance the security of your site. It deals with traffic and SEO tools, security and backup services. If you use a paid version of Jetpack, you can optionally put ads on your site and make money from those ads. Just install and relax knowing that Jetpack is protecting your site.
Conclusion:
Every single plugin claim and offer unique features. Therefore, you do not need to download all the plugin listed above but can surely try and see what works best for you and your site. All the plugins listed above are compatible with a website’s version of WordPress and installed in huge number. Also receiving positive reviews, all of them are free, safe, easily usable but you can go for premium versions for more advanced security features. Secure your site with minimal input and friendly budget.
Besides that, if you want to learn more about WordPress, consider checking out some of our other articles:
- How to Manually Update WordPress in Simple Steps
- Simple Guide to Install WordPress Plugin
- How to block an IP address in WordPress
The WordFence plugin is really a plugin that in my opinion is very effective in preventing hackers who will infiltrate the login page. Besides that this plugin can also ward off malware because it has been equipped with firewall protection. Highly recommended for sites that are ranked on page one with the most search volume, of course, has many competitors that endanger the existence of the site.
Wooww… thankyou for recommendation. Wordfence security looks so good. Let me give a try