The scale of attacks on websites and blogs worldwide is increasing on a daily basis, and the situation is only going to get worse.
It’s safe to assume that if you haven’t been hacked yet, then it’s only a matter of time before someone attempts to hack into your site.
On March 11, 2014, technology sites like Cnet.com began reporting that over 160,000+ WordPress websites had been hacked.
Thousands of websites are attacked every year! Could yours be next?
(Image source: BlogDefender website)
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 WordPress websites and direct a distributed-denial-of-service cyberattack (DDoS) towards another popular website.
Every website with a security vulnerability can be seen as an opportunity to hackers. No site is safe from being targeted. Large, medium and small sites, personal blogs, government websites … even web sites owned by web security experts can and have been targeted.
If a malicious user can find a security flaw that allows them to remotely take control of your website or blog, your website or blog can then be employed to target larger and more valued web sites.
The reality is that brute-force software bots are most likely looking for security exploits and trying to break into your website while you are reading this page. Whether they can break in or not, depends on how hard or easy you will make things for hackers to keep persisting until they work out how to get access, or give up and decide to look for an easier target.
How Much Information Are You Broadcasting To Hackers About Your WordPress Site?
Do you own a WordPress site? If so, visit a site like Hackertarget.com and run your website through their WordPress security scan …
(Hackertarget – WP Security Scan Screenshot source: Hackertarget.com)
You will see that the check returns various results and information about your website setup …
(WordPress security scan 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: BlogDefender site)
Being able to see which version of WordPress you are using, which plugins and themes you have installed on your site, and which files have been uploaded to certain directories can all be useful information to hackers, as this informs them about potentially exploitable vulnerabilities, especially where site owners haven’t updated their sites.
Fortunately, there is a simple and inexpensive solution to stop broadcasting all of this information about your website and make your site invisible to malicious attackers and bots.
Blog Defender
Product Description
Blog Defender is a package of WordPress security video tutorials, plugins and tools, plus a WordPress security PDF/DOC file.
Matt Garrett, the creator of BlogDefender began developing BlogDefender after noticing that a WordPress blog he set up for his mother got hacked into. This particular site had literally nothing to offer, yet it was still attacked.
Matt only became aware of what had happened after being suspended by his host and seeing that a significant amount of suspicious activity had occurred inside the site, as well as the addition of several malicious files designed to lure unsuspecting visitors to the site and hijack financial information.
(Screenshot image: BlogDefender.com)
This simple example is evidence that all websites are valuable to hackers.
Blog Defender scans you WordPress installation for potential security vulnerabilities …
And let’s you fix these quickly …
Blog Defender – Plugins
The product suite comes with 3 plugins for WordPress:
The first plugin in the product suite helps you schedule automated backups …
(Product image: BlogDefender website)
Plugin #1 lets you do automated site and file backups to your server, third-party servers and leading cloud-based solutions using a number of backup methods, schedule complete or partial backups, exclude files or tables from backups, restore previous backups, replace URLs (useful when migrating websites to new domains or server locations), search and replace text strings in your WordPress database, perform auto database scans and repairs, and more.
Plugin #2 provides your WP website or blog with security …
(Image source: BlogDefender website)
This plugin provides a range of vital site and file protection functions (see “Plugin Features” section below).
The third plugin allows you to scan your files and content to detect if anything has been altered, and repair problems …
(Image source: Blog Defender)
Pro Plugin # 3 also scans content to see if any malicious content have been added to your site files, bans bad bots, blocks brute force attacks and detects any content leeching (where people benefit from your content without offering you any reciprocal benefit or value in return).
Blog Defender – Videos
In addition to plugins, the Blog Defender WordPress security suite also includes training videos plus PDF/DOC documentation that will show you exactly what you need to do to protect your website from malicious attacks …
(Image source: BlogDefender.com)
Go here to learn more:
Benefits
Below are just some of the benefits of using Blog Defender to make your WordPress site invisible to hackers and botnets on your site:
Fast And Easy To Install And Use
The plugins install just like every other WordPress plugin. Just upload a zip file that contains the plugins to your Plugins folder via your WordPress dashboard and activate.
Simple And Easy To Follow Training
Blog Defender can be used as a practical training product that will take you through the website security process and show you what to do, including how to set everything up, and even which WordPress plugins you can use for free to get the job done inexpensively.
Some additional benefits include:
- Protect your site from hackers, spammers, botnets, data mining tools and malicious users attempting to exploit your site for personal and financial gain at your expense.
- Secure Your Info Products – If you’re an info product creator (e.g. downloadable e-books, videos, etc.), your work can be stolen and end up as freeware on free downloading sites.
- Avoid Getting Blocked By Your Web Host And Delisted By Search Engines – When a website is hacked, expect to go through a whole lot of inconvenience and heartache. It can take days to uncover the problem and sort through any issues these have caused. In the meantime, your, web presence can be closed by your webhost, or even deindexed by search engines. In addition, your contacts can end up being spammed, your subscriber list and financial details could be stolen, you could end up being fined or even charged with fraud, and much more.
Blog Defender Features
Blog Defender hide your WordPress web site from hackers and malicious botnets.
The product addresses the following security areas:
- Hosting Security Advisory
- WordPress Plugin Security Audits
- WP Theme Security Audits
- Anti Brute Force Security
- Anti Cross-Site Scripting
- MySQL Database Security
- Nefarious Traffic Blocking
- Hide WordPress ‘Tell Tale’ Signs
- Anti-Comment Spam Blocking
- File Monitoring
- Link Monitoring
- Blocking Known Offenders
- Automate WordPress Updates
- WordPress Security Audit
- Tighten Server Security
- Kick Out Policy
- Reputation Checking
- And More …
Blog Defender follows a logical sequence of steps to help protect your your WordPress installation, addressing hosting security, using tools to identify risky WordPress themes and plugins, and then implementing website-wide security using the tools and plugins provided.
(Blog Defender WordPress security process. Source: BlogDefender site)
User Testimonials
Here are a few of the testimonials that plugin users have provided for the Blog Defender product suite:
”Great way to secure your blog!” JohnThornhill – www.johnthornhill.com
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”Since working with blogs, I… like many others, have been concerned about how to handle the constant threat of blog attacks. After having a look at Blog Defender you can’t help but become most aware of the vulnerable areas all bloggers need to protect. Blog Defender is viable WordPress blog security prevention system that offers video instruction along with 3 software plugins that are free to download. The instruction shows the optimum settings on how to use the free plugins that will allow you top level force against blog hacker attacks.” Micheal Nicholas, Impact Info Marketing
Useful Tips
According to Matt Garrett’s site, no Blog Defender-protected sites were hacked since Blog Defender was first released.
Matt Garrett, the product developer states on his site, however …
“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 developers presently can access. The latest release of Blog Defender creates an easier security solution that doesn’t need constant attention, is quite inexpensive and it’s as good if not better than most premium security products or services currently being offered at a higher price.
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, complete refund guarantee.
Software Price
Blog Defender is normally available with a personal license only for use 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.
Please Note: Price details for Blog Defender depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. The above reflects the price at the time this content was published. This may or may not be the actual pricing set by the product seller when you visit the plugin site and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after purchasing.
Check the plugin’s website for current pricing details:
Additional Plugin Info
For installation instructions and tutorials, FAQs, support help desk, contact details and more, visit the Blog Defender website.
In Conclusion
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 websites.
WordPress is a secure platform, but neglecting simple maintenance tasks like keeping your WP software, WordPress plugins and WordPress themes updated to their latest versions, tightening file and data protection and taking other necessary precautions can have disastrous consequences.
Adopting security procedures such as the one Blog Defender provides, will help you understand what’s going on in your site and where the security holes are, what hosting companies can and can’t do if your sites are compromised, what security features to look for in a webhost, and how to avoid major security risks without paying for costly solutions.
For more details, visit the plugin website here: Blog Defender
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