The scale of attacks on websites and blogs around the world is rising, and the situation is getting worse.
It’s safe to assume that if you haven’t been hacked yet, then it’s only a matter of time.
On March 11, 2014, technology sites like Cnet.com began reporting that over 162,000 WordPress-powered web sites had been hacked.
Thousands of websites are hacked every year! Will yours be one of them?
(Screenshot source: 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 reported by security firm Sucuri, hackers had leveraged a well-known flaw to attack unsuspecting WordPress web sites and direct a distributed-denial-of-service attack (DDoS) towards another popular website.
You may think that your website or blog is of little value to hackers, but the reality is that to a hacker, every website is an opportunity to profit or benefit at your expense.
If a malicious user can exploit a weakness in your security setup and gain complete control of your website, that website or blog can then be used to attack more valued websites.
The truth is that malicious bots are probably scouring for exploits and trying to break into your website or blog as you are reading this article. Whether they can achieve this or not, will depend on how hard or easy you will make it for hackers to keep trying until they discover how to get access, or are forced to give up and decide to look for a more vulnerable target.
How Much Information Are You Broadcasting To Hackers About Your WordPress Site?
Does your website run on WordPress? If so visit a site like Hackertarget.com and run your site through their WordPress security check …
(Website Security Scan Screenshot image: Hackertarget.com)
You will see that the check will return a number of results and details about your website …
(WP security check results. Product image source: Hackertarget.com)
It should be obvious after using the above tool that if you can access all of this information, then so can hackers.
(Screenshot image: BlogDefender site)
The ability to see which version of WordPress you are using, which plugins and themes you have installed, and which files have been uploaded to certain directories in your site can all be potentially valuable information to hackers, as this can inform them about any exploitable holes or weaknesses, especially in older versions.
Fortunately, there is a simple and inexpensive solution that can stop broadcasting all of this information about your web site and help to protect it against other malicious threats.
Blog Defender WordPress Security Solution
Product Description
Blog Defender is a package of WordPress security video tutorials, plugins and tools, plus WordPress security documentation in PDF and DOC formats.
Matt Garrett, the creator of BlogDefender developed BlogDefender after noticing that a WordPress-driven site he set up for his mother got hacked into and suspended. This blog had literally nothing to offer, yet it still was targeted by hackers.
Matt only became aware of this after being suspended by his host and noticing that a significant amount of suspicious activity had occurred inside his server, as well as the addition of several malicious files by whoever had broken into his mother’s site.
(Screenshot source: Blog Defender)
This example illustrates the fact that every website has some value to hackers.
Blog Defender scans you website for potential security weaknesses …
And let’s you easily fix these …
Blog Defender – WordPress Plugins
The Blog Defender security suite includes 3 plugins:
Pro Plugin #1 “Automated Backups” in the Blog Defender suite provides automated backups …
(Product image source: Blog Defender)
The plugin lets you do automated backups to your server, third-party servers and well-known cloud storage solutions using a number of backup methods (e.g. FTP), schedule full or partial backups, exclude tables or files from backups, restore previous backups, replace URLs (useful when migrating sites to new domains or server locations), do mass text replacements in your WordPress database, perform auto database scans and repairs, and more.
The second plugin provides WordPress security …
(Image source: BlogDefender.com)
Plugin #2 provides a range of file and site protection functions (see “Blog Defender Features” section below).
Plugin #3 “WordPress Scan & Repair” lets you scan your plugins, themes and WP core files to see if anything unusual in your source code or files has been changed, and repair any problems it detects …
(Source: BlogDefender.com)
Pro Plugin # 3 also scans content to see if any malicious content have been inserted into your site files, bans bad bots, blocks brute force attacks and detects any content leeching (where people benefit from your content without providing any reciprocal value in return).
Blog Defender – Training Videos
In addition to the plugins, the Blog Defender security product suite also includes several video training guides and PDF/DOC documentation that will show you exactly how to protect your website from malicious attacks …
(Screenshot: BlogDefender website)
Learn more about this plugin here:
Benefits Of Using Blog Defender
Below we have listed just some of the benefits of using Blog Defender to make your WordPress site invisible to hackers and botnets on your site:
Quick And Easy To Install And Configure
The plugins included in the Blog Defender product are quite easy to install. Just upload them to your Plugins folder via your administrator account and activate.
Really Simple And Easy To Follow
Blog Defender is a training product that will take you through the website security process and show you exactly what to do, including how to set things up, and even which plugins you can install for free to get the job done.
Additional benefits include:
- Protect your site from hackers, spammers, bad bots, data miners and malicious users attempting to ruin your business for personal and financial gain at your expense.
- Protects Intellectual Property From Being Stolen – If you’re a digital product creator (e.g. downloadable ebooks, video tutorials, etc.), your product can end up as freeware on peer-to-peer sharing sites.
- Avoid Getting Blocked By Your Web Host And Banned By Search Engines – When a site is hacked, you can expect to go through a whole lot of inconvenience and aggravation. It can take days to uncover problems and sort through the issues these have caused. In the meantime, your, websites can get closed by your host, or even deindexed by search engines. And if this isn’t enough to have to deal with, hackers can spam your contact list and steal your business and financial information, you could end up being fined or even charged with fraud, and more.
Plugin Features
Blog Defender provides many great features to WP users.
Blog Defender covers the following issues:
- Hosting Security Advisory
- WordPress Plugin Security Audits
- WordPress Theme Security Audits
- Anti Brute Force Security
- Anti Cross-Site Scripting
- WordPress Database Security
- Nefarious Traffic Blocking
- Hiding WordPress ‘Tell Tale’ Signs
- Anti-Comment Spam Blocking
- File Monitoring
- Track Links
- Blocking Known Offenders
- Automating WordPress Updates
- WordPress Security Audit
- Tightening Server Security
- Kick Out Policy
- Online Reputation Checking
- And More …
Blog Defender follows a logical sequence of steps for securing your web site, addressing potential hosting security issues, using tools to quickly identify risky themes and WordPress plugins, and then implementing website-wide security using the tools and plugins provided.
(Blog Defender website security process. Product image source: BlogDefender site)
User Feedback
Here are some of the testimonials that customers have written about Blog Defender:
”This is a seriously good product!” Simon Hodgkinson, www.hodgkinsonpublishing.com
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”Just one tip could have prevented my blogs getting hacked!” Richard Legg – www.richard-legg.com
Useful Tips
According to Matt Garrett, the plugin developer, no Blog Defender-protected sites were hacked since Blog Defender was first released.
Matt Garrett states on his site …
“With the volume of attacks nowadays … we probably won’t hold forever, so we’ve been busy creating even tougher WordPress security.”
The war on hackers is is a perpetual game of cat and mouse and all security solutions are only as good as the knowledge and tools that developers currently can harness. The latest release of Blog Defender creates an easier security solution that doesn’t require constant attention, won’t cost a fortune and it’s as good if not better than most web security products or services currently being offered at a higher price.
Product Support
The product is well-supported, can be used by both Mac and PC users, is compatible with the latest WordPress release and is backed by a risk-free, 30 day, full money-back guarantee.
Product License Pricing
Blog Defender is normally available for personal use only on unlimited sites. When we last checked, however, it was also being sold with Developer rights, allowing users to secure client sites as well.. Price = $47.00.
Note: Price details for this product can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. The price above was current when this review was written. This may not be the actual pricing charged by the product developer when you visit the plugin site and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing here:
Additional Information
For help documentation and tutorials, FAQs, customer help desk, contact details and more, visit the Blog Defender website.
Use These Plugins
Regardless of the type of business you run or plan to run online and how small you think your web presence is, you simply cannot ignore the importance of securing your sites.
WordPress is a secure web platform, but neglecting basic maintenance tasks like keeping your WordPress core files, WordPress plugins and WP themes updated to their latest versions, tightening file and data protection and taking other necessary precautions can expose your website to attacks by hackers and bots.
Blog Defender helps you understand what’s going on in your site and where the security holes are, what hosting companies can and can’t do if the security on your site is compromised, what security features to look for in a webhost, and how to avoid all the major security risks without costly solutions.
For complete details, check out the plugin here: Blog Defender
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