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

These attacks were caused by botnets (infected computer networks programmed to attack other sites).

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

On March 11, 2014, technology sites reported that 162,000 WordPress web sites had been hacked.

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

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)

According to security firm Sucuri, hackers had leveraged a flaw to attack unsuspecting WordPress web sites and direct a distributed-denial-of-service cyberattack (DDoS) towards another popular website.

Whenever brute force attacks on WordPress sites take place on such a wide scale, it’s natural for people to question if WordPress really is a safe platform for building and running their sites.

Being the world’s most used CMS makes WordPress a target for hacker attacks. But do you really need to be concerned about WordPress as being a secure platform for building your business web presence?

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

WordPress Security Explained

Let’s start by looking at some facts …

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

The scale of attacks on websites and blogs around the world is rising, and it’s getting worse.

You can safely 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 your website has been built with!

Since it’s not a matter of if, but a matter of when before your website will be targeted by malicious hackers, are there any advantages that WordPress can offer you in terms of security?

How Vulnerable Are “Open Source” Applications?

Some people will often try and argue that WordPress should not be used for running websites or blogs because its “open source” code is freely available.

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

The argument against WordPress, then, goes something like this: If anyone can access the Open Source code for WordPress, then hackers can easily download the code and go through every single line, looking for weaknesses and vulnerabilities in the code that can be exploited …

(It’s no longer a matter of if, but when before a malicious user tries to hack your website … WordPress or no WordPress!)

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

The reason for this is that WordPress has the support of a global community comprised of hundreds of software programmers, plugin developers and theme designers who constantly help improve the platform and make WordPress more secure …

(An open volunteer community is responsible for building and maintaining WordPress. Image: make.wordpress.org)

WordPress continually evolves because of the effort of a global community working around the clock to fix issues. It benefits from hundreds of individuals dedicated to improving the software and making it safer for every user …

(The WordPress core software is built and maintained by a large community of web developers. Source: WordPress.org)

The moment any security vulnerabilities are identified by developers or users, the WordPress core developers are then notified …

(WordPress is continually being improved upon by an open community of users and web developers. Image: WordPress.org)

The WordPress community support system is quite formidable and anyone can contribute to improving the platform.

For example:

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

This is the reason why the WordPress team is constantly releasing new version updates, and why you continually need to keep your WordPress site frequently updated …

(WordPress continually releases new version updates to address any security weaknesses found)

WordPress Vs Proprietary Applications

Compare what we have just discussed above with proprietary technologies where often the responsibility for maintaining software security, fixing bugs, etc. falls to a smaller team of developers with limited resources and you will quickly realize the value of using WordPress to power your web presence on a secure platform.

WordPress is 100% free to download, modify and use, and thousands of volunteers and expert developers are continually working to improve 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 CMS Applications

(CMS Platforms)

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

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

(National Vulnerability Database – Security Vulnerabilities IN CMS Platforms. Screenshot source: National Vulnerability Database)

Other research shows that, because WordPress is quite easy to use and to update, when sites using different CMS platforms were tested for security exploits, sites run on WordPress had less exposure to risk …

(BlogDefender.com – CMS Tests. Image source: BlogDefender.com)

Don’t Blame The Technology

When WordPress sites get subjected to brute-force attacks, you shouldn’t be too quick to blame the WordPress CMS platform.

According to a report called “Compromised Websites: An Owner’s Perspective,” which is published by security organizations Commtouch and StopBadware, most webmasters are not fully aware of the threats their websites are exposed to, how to properly secure a website, or deal with web security compromises.

In fact, 63% of webmasters surveyed in this report didn’t know how their sites were compromised by hackers after an attack …

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

Of more immediate concern for WordPress users, however, is the fact that many security problems seem to be related to users simply not upgrading their CMS software to a newer version …

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

When WordPress security issues were examined in more detail, it was found that only a small percentage of vulnerabilities discovered in 3rd-party code are found in the WordPress CMS core, while most security issues are found in plug-ins and developed externally …

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

Like all robust web applications, WordPress is updated regularly in order to address new security risks that could arise. Improving security is an ongoing 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 how secure WordPress is has even caused the co-founder of WordPress, Matt Mullenweg, to chime in and reply to posts online.

In an article entitled “A Bank Website on WordPress” posted 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 use WordPress to build their websites, including banks, large organizations, and e-commerce sites, not just bloggers.

Other Issues That Can Affect WP Website Security

Other issues that can affect website security include:

• No platform is completely protected from hacking. As many as 90% of all websites across all platforms are vulnerable to attack, mostly due to outdated software.
• The main security threat in all CMS platforms seems to be the users themselves. For example, many users ignore strong password security recommendations.
• Lack of constant system monitoring. All security systems need regular monitoring, testing, updating and improvement.
• Hosting setup. For example, websites on shared hosting are only as safe as the least safe website on the grid, so if someone else on your shared server gets their site broken into, then every site on your server becomes vulnerable.

There Is No Reason Why You Should Not Choose WordPress

As this article has hopefully shown, WordPress is a secure web platform. As long as you commit to implementing basic security measures and keep your WordPress software (and themes, plugins, etc.) regularly up-to-date, there is really no reason to avoid choosing WordPress to run your web site or blog.

WordPress Security – Practical Tips

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

An unsecured web site offers hackers with a valuable platform to launch denial of service attacks, spread malware and use your website to defraud others. Blog Defender makes your WordPress site invisible to hackers and botnets. Learn more about it here:

• A Review Of Blog Defender – WordPress Security Plugin

If you are currently using an outdated WordPress version remember to back up everything before updating your software to benefit from the latest security updates. This way, if things don’t go as planned, you can always restore things back to their former state.

If you don’t want to perform manual backups, there are many WordPress plugins you can use. You can read about a WordPress backup plugin that can automate your site backups here: Backup, Duplicate And Protect Your WordPress Web Sites With Backup Creator WordPress Plugin

References

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 issues that can affect your website and how WordPress can help you expand your business online. To learn more about using the WP CMS software 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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