In April 2013 a global brute-force attack struck WordPress installations on virtually every WP host server in existence.

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

(WordPress is often the target of malicious attacks by hackers)

On March 11, 2014, many leading technology sites reported that 160,000+ WordPress-powered websites had been hacked.

(160,000+ WordPress sites were attacked in a massive DDoS attack in March 2014. Image source: BlogDefender site)

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 flaw to attack unsuspecting WordPress sites and direct a distributed-denial-of-service cyberattack (DDoS) towards another popular website.

Whenever global brute force attacks happen on WordPress sites, it’s natural for people to question if WordPress really is a secure platform for building and running a business web presence.

WordPress is often the target of attacks by hackers, due to its popularity. But should you be concerned about WordPress as being a secure web platform?

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

WordPress Security Explained

Let’s start with some facts …

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

The scale of attacks on websites and blogs around the world is rising, and things are getting worse.

It’s probably safe to assume that if your website or blog hasn’t been hacked yet, then it’s inevitable that at some point in time someone will attempt to hack into your site … regardless of the web platform you use!

Since it’s no longer a matter of if, but when before your website will be targeted by malicious hackers, are there any advantages that WordPress can offer you in terms of security?

”Isn’t Open Source Software Unsafe?”

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

Open source CMS software like WordPress, Drupal and Joomla are free to use and anyone can access the underlying code.

The argument against WordPress, then, goes something like this: If everyone can examine the Open Source software code for WordPress, then hackers can easily obtain all of the code and study it in detail, looking for security vulnerabilities they can exploit …

(It’s not a matter of if, but when before a malicious user attempts to hack your website … WordPress or no WordPress!)

While it’s true that WordPress is a free program and hackers can easily go through the code looking for security weaknesses or vulnerabilities (hackers can do the same with any software), the fact that WordPress is a free, open software platform actually makes it a whole lot more secure in several ways.

The reason for this is that WordPress is supported by a huge volunteer community that consists of hundreds of people such as software programmers, plugin developers and theme designers who are constantly working to help to improve the program and make WordPress more secure …

(With WordPress, a volunteer community of thousands of web developers is responsible for keeping the software code maintained and updated. Image source: WordPress.org)

WordPress evolves through the effort of hundreds of committed individuals working around the clock to fix issues. It benefits from thousands of minds committed to improving the application and making the WordPress platform safer for every user …

(WordPress is built by a large community of web developers. Source: WordPress.org)

The moment that a security vulnerability is identified by developers or users, the WordPress development team are then notified …

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

The WordPress community support system, therefore, is solid and formidable and anybody can contribute to the improvement of the platform.

For example:

• If you come across bugs or security holes, you can report these by sending an email to security@wordpress.org.
• If you find issues in a plugin, you can report these by emailing plugins@wordpress.org.

This is the reason why WordPress releases new updates on a regular basis, and why you continually need to keep your WordPress site regularly updated …

(WordPress frequently releases new version updates to address any security exploits found)

WordPress Vs Proprietary CMS Applications

We’ve just seen that one of the security advantages of using an ”open” technology like WordPress is that users benefit from a large community of developers who continually contribute to improve platform security. By contrast, proprietary or “closed-source” CMS applications are typically developed by a small team of developers with limited time and resources to provide continuous security monitoring, software maintenance, bug fixes and updates.

The WordPress CMS is free to download, use and modify, and hundreds of volunteers and expert developers work on improving the software. Can a proprietary CMS company afford to employ as many developers and programmers and still deliver you a completely free platform that you can download, use and modify as you wish?

WordPress Vs Other Open Source CMS Applications

(CMS Platforms include WordPress, Joomla and Drupal)

Whilst on the topic of Open Source content management systems, research shows that the WordPress CMS is safer than other Open Source CMS platforms such as Drupal and Joomla.

For example, the chart below shows the number of security vulnerabilities discovered in popular CMS platforms …

(WordPress has less security vulnerabilities than other leading CMS applications. Image source: National Vulnerability Database)

Other research shows that, because WordPress is easy to use and keep up-to-date, when sites using different CMS platforms were tested for security exploits, sites built with WordPress had less exposure to risk …

(WordPress users are not as exposed to security threats as other CMS platform users. Screenshot: BlogDefender.com)

Don’t Blame The Technology

When WordPress sites get attacked en masse, users shouldn’t be too quick to place the blame on the WordPress CMS platform.

According to security vendor Commtouch and StopBadware, a nonprofit organization that helps webmasters identify, remediate and prevent website compromises in a published report entitled “Compromised Websites: An Owner’s Perspective“, many webmasters have no idea about the security threats their websites are exposed to, how to secure a website, or deal with compromised web security.

In fact, over sixty percent of webmasters surveyed for the report didn’t even know how their sites had been compromised by hackers after an attack …

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

Of immediate concern is the fact that most security-related issues arise from site owners not upgrading their WordPress software to the latest version …

(Many security issues come from sites running an outdated version of WordPress. Source: Sucuri.net)

When WordPress security issues were looked at in more detail, it was found that only around between 20% – 30% percent of vulnerabilities discovered in third-party code are found in the WordPress core software, while most security issues are found in plug-ins and developed externally …

(WP Security Issues. Screenshot image: WebDesign.org)

Like many modern software platforms, WordPress is regularly updated to deal with new security risks that can arise. Improving software security is always a concern, and to that end, you should always keep up to date with the latest version of WordPress software, themes, plugins, etc..

WordPress … Good Enough For Banks To Use!

The amount of misinformation online about WordPress security has even led Matt Mullenweg, the co-founder of WordPress, to chime in and reply to posts online.

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

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 around the world, including banks, global corporations and e-commerce sites use WordPress to build their presence online, not just bloggers.

Other Issues That Can Affect Security

Other areas that can affect security include issues such as:

• No platform is immune to hackers. As many as 90% of all websites across all platforms are vulnerable to being attacked, mostly due to software that is out of date.
• The biggest security threat in all content management platforms seems to be the users themselves. For example, many users ignore good password security practices.
• Lack of constant monitoring. Security processes need to be frequently monitored, tested, updated and improved.
• Server setup. For example, websites on shared webhosting are only as safe as the least secure website on the hosting grid, so if another user on your shared server gets their site hacked into, then all sites on the server are potentially vulnerable to being hacked as well.

There’s No Reason To Avoid Choosing WordPress

As you can see, WordPress is a secure web platform. As long as you remember to implement basic website security measures (which all website owners should do, regardless of their web platform) and keep your WordPress software (and plugins, themes, etc.) up-to-date, there’s really no reason not to use WordPress for your website or blog.

WordPress Security – Useful Tips

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

An unsecured website presents malicious users with a valuable platform for distributed attacks, spreading malware and as a source of information theft. Blog Defender makes your WordPress site invisible to botnet and hacker attacks. Go here to learn more:

• How To Make Your Web Sites Invisible To Hackers With Blog Defender Security Plugin

If you are currently using an outdated WordPress version make sure to back up your WordPress site files and data before updating your software to benefit from the latest security updates. This way, if something goes wrong, you can always restore.

If you don’t want to back up your data manually, there are many WordPress plugins you can use. Learn about a WordPress backup plugin that can fully automate your site backups here: Back Up, Duplicate And Protect Your WordPress Site With Backup Creator WP Plugin

Article References

For more information on the above, see the following sources:

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

Hopefully, this post has given you a better understanding of problems that can affect your web site and how WordPress can help you get better results online. To learn more about using the WP software please click on links to visit other articles we have published on this site or subscribe to receive updates and notifications when new content is published.

***