In April 2013 a worldwide brute force attack began hitting WordPress installations on almost every WP hosting server in existence around the world.

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

(WordPress often comes under attack by hackers)

On March 11, 2014, many technology sites began reporting that over 162,000 WordPress-powered sites had been hacked.

(Over 160,000 WordPress sites were attacked in a massive DDoS attack in March 2014. Screenshot 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 described by security firm Sucuri, hackers had leveraged a well-known flaw to attack unsuspecting WP web sites and direct a distributed-denial-of-service cyber-attack (DDoS) towards another popular website.

Whenever global brute force attacks happen on WordPress sites, it’s natural for website owners to start questioning just how safe and secure WordPress is as an application for running their sites.

WordPress powers millions of websites around the world, making it a frequent target for attempted hacking attacks. But should you really 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 definitely consider using 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 sheer number of attacks on websites and blogs around the world is massive, and it’s only going to get 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 no longer a matter of if, but a matter of 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?

Some people often argue that WordPress is not a secure platform for running a website or blog because its “open source” code is freely available.

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

The argument against using WordPress, then, goes something like this: If anyone can view the Open Source software code for WordPress, then hackers can easily get hold of all of the code and study it in detail, searching for security holes that can be exploited …

(It’s no longer a matter of if, but a matter of when before someone attempts to hack your website … 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 holes or weaknesses (hackers can do the same with any software program), the fact that WordPress is a free, open-source application actually makes it more secure in several ways.

This is because WordPress has the support of a large community of thousands of software programmers, plugin developers and theme designers who constantly help to improve the platform and make WordPress more secure …

(WordPress is built, maintained and updated by a community of volunteers worldwide. Screenshot image: make.wordpress.org)

WordPress continually evolves because of the effort of hundreds of committed individuals working around the clock to fix any issues detected by users. It benefits from hundreds of individuals committed to improving the application and making it safer for every user …

(WordPress is built and maintained by a large community of users. Screenshot: make.wordpress.org)

The moment any security issues are identified by developers or users, the WordPress development team are then made aware of it …

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

The WordPress community support system is solid and formidable and anyone can contribute to fixing the software.

For example:

• If you discover bugs or security exploits, you can report these by emailing security@wordpress.org.
• If you find any issues in a plugin, you can also report these by emailing plugins@wordpress.org.

This is one of the reasons why WordPress is constantly releasing new version updates, and why you need to keep your WordPress sites and blogs updated and maintained …

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

WordPress Vs Proprietary Applications

Contrast the benefits of using an open source CMS platform like WordPress with proprietary CMS platforms where often the responsibility for improving software security, fixing bugs, etc. falls to a smaller team of developers with limited resources and you will very quickly understand the security benefits of using WordPress to run your site on a secure platform.

The WordPress CMS is 100% free to download, use and modify, and hundreds of volunteers and expert developers are continually working to improve the software. Can a proprietary technology company afford to employ as many developers and programmers and still deliver users a completely free CMS platform that they can 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 applications, there is valid research to support the fact that the WordPress CMS is safer than other Open Source CMS platforms like Drupal and Joomla.

For example, the chart below shows how many security vulnerabilities were discovered in popular platforms during a given period …

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

Other research indicates that, because WordPress is quite easy to use and update, when sites across different CMS platforms were tested for security vulnerabilities, sites built with WordPress had significantly less exposure to risk …

(WordPress has less exposure to risk than other CMS platforms. Source: BlogDefender.com)

WordPress Is Not At Fault

Whenever WordPress sites are attacked en masse, don’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 a nonprofit organization that helps webmasters identify, remediate and prevent website compromises called StopBadware and security vendor Commtouch, many webmasters are not fully aware of the threats their websites are exposed to, how to properly secure a website, or deal with compromised web security.

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

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

Of more immediate concern is the fact that most security-related issues come from site owners not upgrading their CMS software to a newer version …

(Many WordPress users have not upgraded their software. Screenshot source: Sucuri.net)

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

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

Like all robust software applications, WordPress is updated regularly to address new security risks that can arise. Improving software security is an ongoing concern, and to that end, you should always keep up to date with the latest version of WordPress.

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 …

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, leading brands and e-commerce sites use WordPress to build their websites, not just bloggers.

Other Areas Affecting Site Security

Other issues that can affect WP website security include:

• No platform is completely immune to hacking. As many as 90% of all websites across all platforms are vulnerable to attack, mostly due to using outdated software.
• The biggest security vulnerability in all content management systems seems to be the users themselves. An example of this is users ignoring strong password security practices.
• Lack of constant monitoring. All security systems need frequent monitoring, testing, updating and improvement.
• Webhosting server setup. For example, websites on shared hosting accounts are only as safe as the least safe site on the grid, so if another user on your shared server gets their site broken into, then all sites on that server become vulnerable to hacking as well.

There Is No Reason Not To Choose 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 chosen web platform) and keep your WordPress software (and themes, plugins, etc.) updated, there’s no reason to avoid using WordPress to drive your web site or blog.

WordPress Security – Useful Tips

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

A vulnerable web site offers hackers with a resource to launch denial of service attacks, spread malware and use your website to defraud innocent people. Blog Defender Security Plugin makes your WordPress site invisible to hackers and bots. Learn more about this plugin here:

• Blog Defender Review

If you are using older WordPress versions make sure you back up your files before updating your software to benefit from the latest security updates. This way, if something goes wrong, you can always restore things back to their former state.

If you don’t want to perform manual backups, there are many plugins you can use. You can read about a WordPress backup plugin that can fully automate your backup process here: Backup, Copy And Keep Your WordPress Websites Protected With Backup Creator Plugin For WordPress

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 expand your business online. To learn more about the security benefits of using WordPress for a business website or blog please click on links to visit our related posts section or subscribe to receive updates and notifications when new articles are published.

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