WordPress powers millions of sites worldwide, making it a target for hacker attacks.

In 2013, WordPress installations around the world were subjected to global-scale brute force attacks.

These attacks were caused by botnets (networks of infected computers programmed to attack other sites with security vulnerabilities).

How To Protect Your WordPress Site From A Brute-Force Attack

Brute Force Attacks

A brute-force attack is a technique used to break an encryption or authentication system by trying all possibilities.

(Source: Chinese University Of Hong Kong)

One of the many ways hackers use to try and break into WordPress sites is by trying to guess the site’s administration login username and password. This is achieved using scripts and tools that can work through hundreds of possible logins in minutes.

If you’re using easy-to-guess login details, your website could be an easy target for hacking attempts.

This is called a “brute force” login attack.

Botnet Definition

A botnet is a number of Internet-connected computers communicating with other similar machines in an effort to complete repetitive tasks and objectives. This can be as mundane as keeping control of an Internet Relay Chat (IRC) channel, or it could be used to send spam email or participate in distributed denial-of-service attacks. The word botnet is a combination of the words robot and network.

(Source: Wikipedia/botnet)

A “Botnet” is a network of computers that have been compromised and infected with malicious scripts or code, which can then be controlled remotely as a group, often without the computer owners even being aware that this is going on.

Botnets are often used to send mass spam emails from computers of unsuspecting users.

The screenshot below was taken from a site that monitors online security showing the locations of the command centers of a botnet that has been actively infecting computer networks all around the globe since 2009 called “Zeus” …

(The Zeus botnet has been actively compromising computer networks all around the globe since 2009. Screenshot image: SecureList.com)

These were well organized and highly distributed attacks on WordPress. Over 90,000 IP addresses were identified by several webhosting companies in the initial attack alone, when millions of attempts to force their way into WordPress user admin areas took place. The mass brute-force attacks then continued, with over 30,000 WordPress sites and blogs being hacked per day.

Coverage of this brute-force botnet attack was reported by all the major webhosting companiesand leading technology media publications, such as Forbes, TechNews Daily, PC Magazine, Tech Crunch, BBC News, and even on the official website of the US Department of Homeland Security …

(WordPress often comes under attack by hackers)

Does This Mean WordPress Is Not Secure And We Should Stop Using It?

No. In fact, there are many good reasons why you should choose WordPress if you are concerned at all about website security.

We explain why WordPress is a secure web platform in this article: Why WordPress Is A Secure Platform For Websites –

It’s important to note that, in the case of the brute force botnet attack described above, no specific WordPress vulnerability was being exploited (the same script was also attacking sites built using other web platforms like Joomla).

Mike Little, one of the co-founders of WordPress with Matt Mullenweg, made this comment about the brute force attacks:

It is a “simple” script that attempts to login using the admin login and a generated password. So if your password is too short or based on dictionary words it will be guessed and then the script can login legitimately and do whatever it wants including installing scripts (as plugins) or editing files. The attack tries to guess your password, if it succeeds, the most secure site in the world is wide open because they have your password.

(MikeLittle.org)

How To Prevent Your WordPress Site From Being Brute Force Attacked – 10 Security Measures

Every blog with a security vulnerability offers some value to hackers. A vulnerable site offers hackers with a valuable platform to launch denial of service attacks, spread malware and engage in information theft.

If a malicious user can exploit a way to remotely control your site, the website can then be employed to attack other highly-valued websites.

Additional undesirable results of having your site hacked and your site security compromised include getting blacklisted by search engines, having spammy links advertising things like gambling, cheap offers on brand names, etc. inserted in your content, redirecting visitors to phishing sites, drive-by downloads (adding malware on your visitors’ computers), and many other nasties.

The harsh reality is that brute-force software bots are very likely trying to hack into your blog at this very moment. Whether they will do this successfully depends on how difficult you will make it for hackers or botnets to continue trying until they discover a way to get access, or give up and decide to look for a more vulnerable target.

How Much Information About Your Site Are You Broadcasting To Hackers?

Does your website run on WordPress? If so visit a site like Hackertarget.com and run your website through their WordPress security check …

(Hackertarget – WP Security Scan Source: Hackertarget.com)

You will see that the scan returns a number of results and details about your website setup …

(Hackertarget – website security check results. Product image source: Hackertarget.com)

It should be obvious after using the above tool that if you are able to freely access all of this information, so can hackers.

(Product image source: Blog Defender)

Being able to see what version of WordPress you are using, which plugins and themes you have installed, and which files have been uploaded to certain directories are all useful information to hackers, as this informs them about potential holes or weaknesses, especially in older versions.

If your website runs on WordPress and you’re not proactive steps to harden your site, we can practically guarantee that, at some time in the near future, someone will attempt to hack your website, because these attacks are systematically targeting WordPress installations around the world!

Whenever a site gets compromised, site owners can find themselves completely “locked out” of their own site, or notice that their files have been altered or even that their content has been entirely wiped out. Often, most compromised sites will be infected with malicious software or viruses without the owner’s knowledge or awareness.

To avoid the heartache and aggravation (and potential loss of valuable business data) that comes with discovering that your web site has been hacked into, below are 10 simple, yet essential and effective security measures that will help to protect your WordPress site from brute force attacks.

Note: Some of the steps shown below need some technical skills to modify core WordPress and server files. If you have no technical skills, or don’t want to mess around with file code, then ask your web host or search for a professional WordPress technical provider in our WordPress Services Directory.

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Security Measure #1 – Get In Touch With Your Webhosting Service Provider

Contact your hosting company and ask them what security precautions they have put in place to help prevent your site from botnet attacks, and what is done to ensure that your files and data get regularly backed up.

Make sure that your host backs up your server files and that, if disaster strikes, you can quickly and easily get your site back.

Security Measure #2 – Perform Regular WordPress Backups And Keep Your Site Regularly Updated

You should never rely only on your web host for your site backups. Instead, learn how to maintain your WordPress site or get this service done for you and develop a habit of religiously performing a full WordPress site maintenance routine frequently (e.g. daily, weekly, fortnightly, etc …)

A complete WordPress maintenance routine ensures that:

• All unnecessary data and files are removed,
• All WP data and files are free of errors, optimized and backed up,
• All WordPress plugins, themes and software components are up-to-date,
• etc …

A full WP maintenance routine looks like this …

(Maintaining your WP web site regularly backed up and updated is vitally important for WordPress security. Image source: WPTrainMe.com)

Again, we cannot stress enough how important maintaining your WP website backed up and up-to-date is. WordPress maintenance is not hard or time-consuming, but it must be done to ensure the security of your website or blog. If you don’t want to learn how to do WordPress site maintenance yourself, pay a professional to do it but make sure this gets done. Backing up your site is the next most important thing you should do after making sure that you still have a pulse!

If you don’t want to back up your data manually, there are many free and paid plugins you can use. You can read about a WordPress backup plugin that can automate your site backups here: Backup, Clone And Protect Your WP Site With Backup Creator WP Plugin

Security Measure #3 – Do Not Use “Admin” As Your Admin Username

The mass brute-force attack on WordPress sites was mostly an attempt to compromise site administrator panels by exploiting WP installations using “admin” as the user name.

For security reasons, avoid installing sites with the username “admin”. This is the first thing hackers will test. If your site’s username is admin, then change it immediately.

We have created a detailed step-by-step tutorial created especially for WP admin users on how to change your username here: How To Change Your Admin Username In WordPress To Another Username

Security Measure #4 – Choose Strong Passwords

A “brute force” attack occurs when a malicious script continually and persistently hits a login or password field with different strings of characters in an attempt to guess the right login combination that will give them entry to your website.

Unless some measure is put into place to prevent the brute-force attack from happening (see further below for a couple of effective suggestions for doing this), the “bot” will just persist in attacking your site until it eventually breaks into your admin area.

Weak passwords, therefore, are really easy targets for hacking attacks. Make sure that you change your password to something that is at least eight characters long, with upper and lowercase letters, and “special” characters (e.g. %, $, *, etc).

Roboform is a password management tool you can use to create secure passwords …

(Roboform is a password tool that lets you create very secure passwords)

We have created a simple tutorial that shows you how to change your password here: How To Reset Your Login Password

Security Measure #5 – Prevent Access To Your wp-config.php File

The wp-config.php file allows WordPress to communicate with the database to store and retrieve data and is used to define advanced WordPress options.

(wp-config.php)

If hackers break into your site, they will typically search for the wp-config.php file, because this is the file that contains important information about your site’s database, security keys, etc. Getting access to this information would allow them to change anything in your database, create a user account, upload files and take control of your site.

To protect your WordPress site from attacks and even being used as part of a bot net, therefore, prevent your wp-config.php file from being accessible. This requires knowing how to edit database information, move files around in your server and changing access permissions.

Security Measure #6 – Delete Or Rename Unnecessary Website Installation Files

Rename or delete your install.php, upgrade.php and readme.html files.

These files are not required after installation. If you don’t want to remove these files, then just rename them.

Security Measure #7 – Keep Your WordPress Installation, Plugins And Themes Up-To-Date

Hackers are always on the lookout for vulnerabilities in outdated versions of WordPress that they can exploit, including out-of-date versions of WP themes and plugins.

Ensure that all of your WordPress files, plugins, themes, etc. are always up to date.

Security Measure #8 – Disable Your Theme Editor

WordPress installations come with a built-in editor that lets you edit plugin and theme code from the dashboard.

In WordPress, you can access your WordPress Theme Editor by selecting Appearance > Editor in your dashboard menu …

(Accessing the WordPress theme editor via the WordPress admin menu)

This means that anyone logging into your blog can view and change your WordPress theme template files, or create havoc on your site.

To prevent unauthorized people from accessing your WordPress Theme editor, you will need to disable it. This can be done by adding code to your wp-config.php file.

Security Measure #9 – Protect Your WordPress Uploads Directory

The WordPress “uploads” folder contains all the media files that get uploaded to your blog.

Normally, this folder is visible to all users online. All a person needs to do to see the contents stored in your “uploads” directory is visit the directory using their browser …

(WordPress uploads directory)

If any files stored in his folder have weaknesses or vulnerabilities that can be exploited by malicious users, anyone could upload unauthorized file types to your site.

Protecting your directories will prevent unauthorized people from accessing your ‘uploads’ folder and other important directories. This can be done using plugins, setting file permissions, uploading a blank index.php file (this is literally a blank file called “index.php”) to your uploads directory, and so on. Again, it’s best to seek professional help if you are not sure about what to do.

Security Measure #10 – Security Plugins

A number of great WordPress security plugins are available that specifically address most common security issues faced by WordPress site owners, such as preventing unauthorized users from accessing your site, protecting your files from malicious exploits, preventing unauthorized file uploads, etc.

Most WordPress plugins address some but not all areas of WordPress security. One plugin that does a comprehensive job of scanning, fixing and preventing issues that could lead to hackers accessing your files and damaging your site is SecureScanPro.

(SecureScanPro – complete security plugin for WordPress)

SecureScanPro is easy to install and easy to use, and does a great job of fixing most of the security areas that WordPress users need to address.

Another plugin you may want to consider using is BlogDefender.

Blog Defender

(Blog Defender WordPress Security Suite)

This product is a suite of WordPress security video tutorials, plugins and tools, plus a WordPress security PDF/DOC file.

BlogDefender scans you WordPress site for security vulnerabilities …

And then shows you how to fix these quickly …

If you don’t want to invest in a premium security plugin like SecureScanPro or BlogDefender, you can use various free WordPress plugins, such as Limit Login Attempts …

WordPress is a secure web platform, but neglecting basic maintenance tasks like keeping your WordPress installation, plugins and WordPress themes updated to their latest versions, tightening file and data security and taking other necessary precautions can have disastrous consequences.

Regardless of the kind of business you run or plan to run online and how small you think your web presence is, you cannot afford to ignore the importance of securing your website or blog.

As one last reminder of the importance of website security, below is the advice given by a web security expert to all WordPress users following the large-scale brute-force attacks by botnets on WordPress in 2013 …

Owners of websites based on WordPress CMS must improve at least basic security settings and implement best practices such as the use of robust passwords and the accurate management of “admin” accounts.

Pierluigi Paganini, Chief Information Security Officer, Security Affairs

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As you can see, WordPress security is very important if you run a WordPress site. Hopefully, the information in this article has provided you with the initial steps you need to take to keep your WordPress site protected from brute-force attacks. If you need any further help or assistance with WordPress security, please seek help from a WordPress security specialist, or search for a professional WordPress service provider in our WordPress Services Directory.

We also recommend subscribing to WPCompendium.org to receive notifications when we publish new information on WordPress security and reviews of new security plugins and solutions.

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