In early 2013 a worldwide brute-force attack hit WordPress installations on virtually every WP host server in existence around the world.

These attacks were caused by infected computer networks programmed to attack other vulnerable installations, also commonly known as “botnets”.

(WordPress is often the target of malicious attacks by hackers, due to its global popularity)

On March 11, 2014, technology sites like Cnet.com began reporting that 160,000+ legitimate WordPress sites had been hacked.

(160,000+ WordPress sites were attacked in a massive DDoS attack in March 2014. Screenshot: Blog Defender)

According to the Cnet report,

“With some old-fashioned trickery, hackers were able to get more than 162,000 legitimate WordPress-powered Web sites to mount a distributed-denial-of-service attack against another Web site.”

(Source: cnet.com/news/ddos-attack-is-launched-from-162000-wordpress-sites)

As described by security firm Sucuri, hackers had leveraged a well-known flaw to attack unsuspecting WP sites and direct a distributed-denial-of-service attack (DDoS) towards another popular website.

Whenever brute force attacks on WordPress sites take place on a global scale, it’s natural for people to ask if WordPress really is a secure software for running an online presence.

WordPress is often the target of attacks by hackers. But should you really be concerned about WordPress as a secure web platform?

In this article, you will learn some of the main reasons why you should choose WordPress if you have any concerns about website security.

WordPress Security Explained

Let’s start by looking at some facts …

Thousands of websites and blogs are attacked every year … not just WordPress sites!

The sheer number of attacks on websites and blogs worldwide is massive, and it’s getting worse.

It’s safe to assume that if you haven’t been hacked yet, then it’s only a matter of time … regardless of the web platform your website has been built with!

Since it’s no longer a matter of if, but when before a malicious user tries to hack your website, are there any advantages that WordPress can offer you in terms of security?

How Secure Is “Open Source” Software?

Many people will often argue that WordPress should not be used for running websites and blogs because it’s “open source” and freely available software program.

Open-source CMS programs like WordPress, Drupal and Joomla are free to use and anyone can view the entire underlying code.

The argument, then, goes something like this: If anyone can examine the Open Source software code for WordPress, then hackers can also easily download all of the code and go through all of it in detail, searching for holes and weaknesses that can be exploited …

(It’s no longer a matter of if, but when before your website is targeted by hackers … WordPress or no WordPress!)

While it’s true that WordPress is a free application and hackers can easily access it and study the code looking for weaknesses and vulnerabilities (hackers can do the same with any program), the fact that WordPress is a free, open software platform actually makes it more secure in a number of ways.

This is because WordPress is supported by a large volunteer community of hundreds of software programmers, plugin developers and theme designers who constantly help to improve the platform and make WordPress more secure …

(With WordPress, a large community of volunteers worldwide is responsible for keeping the platform updated. Image source: make.wordpress.org)

WordPress continually evolves largely through the effort of hundreds of committed volunteers working around the clock to fix issues. It benefits from thousands of individuals who, at any one time, are focused on improving the software, identifying and fixing security vulnerabilities and making WordPress safer for every user …

(The WordPress core software is built by an open community of volunteer members. Image: WordPress.org)

The moment any security problems are identified by developers or users, these are immediately logged in user forums and addressed by the WordPress development team …

(WordPress is continually being improved upon by thousands of committed individuals community of users and developers. Screenshot: make.wordpress.org)

The WordPress community support system, therefore, is solid and formidable and anyone can help contribute to the process of addressing security issues.

For example:

• If you find bugs or a security hole, you can report these by sending an email to security@wordpress.org.
• If you find any issues in a WP plugin, you can also report these by emailing plugins@wordpress.org.

This is why the WordPress team releases new version updates regularly, and why you continually need to keep your WordPress site regularly up-to-date …

(WordPress frequently releases new updates to address security weaknesses)

WordPress Vs Proprietary CMS Platforms

Compare the benefits of using an open source CMS platform like WordPress with proprietary technologies where often the responsibility for improving software security, fixing bugs, etc. falls to a much smaller team of developers with limited resources and you will quickly understand the value of using WordPress to run your business presence online on a secure platform.

WordPress is free to download, use and modify, and thousands of volunteers and expert developers work on improving the platform. Can a proprietary CMS company afford to employ as many developers and programmers and still deliver users software that is 100% free to download, use and modify as they wish?

WordPress CMS Vs Other Open Source Platforms

(CMS Platforms - WordPress, Joomla and Drupal)

Whilst on the topic of Open Source content management applications, there is valid research to support the fact that WordPress is actually safer than other leading Open Source CMS platforms such as Drupal and Joomla.

For example, the chart below shows the number of security vulnerabilities found in each of these platforms during a given period …

(National Vulnerability Database – Security Vulnerabilities IN CMS Applications. Source: National Vulnerability Database)

Other research shows that, because WordPress is quite easy to use and to maintain, when sites using different CMS platforms were tested for security issues, WordPress sites had fewer exposure to risk …

(BlogDefender.com – CMS Tests. Source: BlogDefender.com)

Don’t Blame The Technology

If someone compromises the security of your WordPress site, don’t be too quick to blame WordPress.

According to a nonprofit organization that helps webmasters identify, remediate and prevent website compromises called StopBadware and security vendor Commtouch in a published report entitled “Compromised Websites: An Owner’s Perspective“, a large number of webmasters are not fully aware of the threats their websites are exposed to, how to properly secure a website, or deal with compromises.

In fact, over 60% of webmasters surveyed in this report didn’t know how their websites were compromised by hackers after an attack …

(Most webmasters don’t know how their sites got hacked. Image source: StopBadware.org)

Of immediate concern for WordPress users, however, is the fact that most security issues seem to be related to website owners running WordPress on outdated versions of the software …

(Many WordPress sites are running on outdated versions. Image: Sucuri.net)

When WordPress security issues were looked at in more detail, it was found that only a small percentage of vulnerabilities discovered in third-party code are actually found in the WordPress CMS core, while 65% – 85% percent of all security issues are found in plug-ins and extensions created by 3rd-party developers …

(WordPress Security Issues. Image source: WebDesign.org)

Like all robust software applications, WordPress is regularly updated to deal with new security problems that could arise. Improving security is always a concern, and to that end, you should always keep your WordPress site, themes, and plugins up-to-date.

WordPress … Good Enough For Banks To Use!

The amount of misinformation online about how secure WordPress is has even led Matt Mullenweg, the co-founder of WordPress, to chime into the debate.

In an article entitled “A Bank Website on WordPress” published on April 15, 2015, Matt wrote the following about WordPress …

There’s a thread on Quora asking “I am powering a bank’s website using WordPress. What security measures should I take?” The answers have mostly been ignorant junk along the lines of “Oh NOES WP is INSECURE! let me take my money out of that bank”, so I wrote one myself, which I’ve copied below.

I agree there’s probably not a ton of benefit to having the online banking / billpay / etc portion of a bank’s website on WordPress, however there is no reason you couldn’t run the front-end and marketing side of the site on WordPress, and in fact you’d be leveraging WordPress’ strength as a content management platform that is flexible, customizable, and easy to update and maintain.

Matt then goes on to provide a couple of security tips, before stating the following …

For an example of a beautiful, responsive banking website built on WordPress, check out Gateway Bank of Mesa AZ. WordPress is also trusted to run sites for some of the largest and most security-conscious organizations in the world, including Facebook, SAP, Glenn Greenwald’s The Intercept, eBay, McAfee, Sophos, GNOME, Mozilla, MIT, Reuters, CNN, Google Ventures, NASA, and literally hundreds more.

As the most widely used CMS in the world, many people use and deploy the open source version of WordPress in a sub-optimal and insecure way, but the same could be said of Linux, Apache, MySQL, Node, Rails, Java, or any widely-used software. It is possible and actually not that hard to run WordPress in a way that is secure enough for a bank, government site, media site, or anything.

Millions of businesses, including banks, global corporations and e-commerce sites choose WordPress to build their web presence, not just bloggers.

Other Issues Affecting WP Security

Other factors that can affect website security include:

• No platform is safe from security threats. As many as 90% of all websites across all platforms are vulnerable to attack, mostly due to using outdated software.
• The biggest threat in all content management platforms seems to be the users themselves. An example of this is users ignoring good password security recommendations.
• Lack of constant system monitoring. All security systems require regular monitoring, testing, updating and improvement.
• Hosting server setup. For example, sites on shared hosting servers are only as secure as the least secure website on the grid, so if another user on your shared server gets their site hacked into, then every site on the shared server becomes vulnerable.

There Is No Reason To Avoid Using WordPress

As this article has hopefully shown, WordPress is as secure as most of the leading web platforms being used by businesses of all sizes to build their presence online. As long as you implement basic web security measures (which all website owners should do) and keep your WordPress software (and plugins, themes, etc.) up-to-date, there’s really no reason why you should not choose WordPress.

WordPress Security – Practical Tips

To learn about ways to protect your WordPress site from brute force attacks see this article:  Protecting WordPress From Brute-Force Attacks

An unsecured blog provides hackers with a platform for denial of service attacks, spreading malware and engage in information theft. Blog Defender Security Plugin for WordPress Sites makes your WordPress site invisible to attacks from hackers and botnets. Learn more about it here:

• Protect Your WP Web Sites From Hackers & Botnets

If you are using older versions of WordPress remember to make a complete backup before updating your software to protect your site from the latest security risks. This way, if things don’t go as planned, you can always restore.

If you don’t want to perform manual backups, there are a number of WordPress plugins you can use. Learn about a WordPress backup plugin that can automate your backup process here: Back Up, Copy And Keep Your WP Site Protected With Backup Creator WP Plugin

References Used In This Article

For more information on the above, refer to the sites below:

• ITProPortal.com
• National Vulnerability Database
• BlogDefender.com
• UpAndUpStudios.com
• StopBadware.org
• Sucuri.net
• WebDesign.org
• Quora.com
• Ma.tt

Hopefully, now you have a better understanding of problems that can affect your web site and how WordPress can help you get better business results online. To learn more about the security benefits of using WordPress please click on links to visit our related posts section or subscribe to receive updates and notifications whenever new articles are published.

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