In 2013, WordPress installations around the world were subjected to a global-scale brute force attack.

These attacks were caused by computers infected with malware and programmed to attack other sites, also commonly known as “botnets”.

(WordPress often comes under attack by hackers)

In March 2014, many leading technology sites reported that over 160,000+ legitimate WordPress web sites had been hacked.

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

When attacks on WordPress sites receive worldwide attention, it’s natural for website owners to start asking if WordPress really is a safe application for running a business web presence.

WordPress powers millions of sites worldwide, which makes it a target for malicious attempts by hackers. But should you really be concerned about WordPress as a secure web platform?

In this article, you will learn some of the main reasons why you should definitely choose WordPress if you have any concerns about website security.

WordPress Security Explained

Let’s start by looking at some facts …

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

The sheer number of attacks on websites and blogs worldwide is increasing on a daily basis, and this is 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 you use!

Since it’s no longer a matter of if, but a matter of when before someone will attempt to hack your website, are there any advantages that WordPress can offer you in terms of security?

”Isn’t Open Source Software Extremely Vulnerable?”

Many people will often argue that WordPress should not be used for building and running websites because having open source code means that anyone can view how the software application runs.

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

The argument against using WordPress, then, goes something like this: If everyone can examine the Open Source code for WordPress, then hackers can easily download the code and study every single line in detail, searching for vulnerabilities in the code that can be exploited …

(It’s no longer a matter of if, but when before someone attempts 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 or vulnerabilities they can exploit (hackers can do the same with any software), the fact that WordPress is a free, open software platform actually makes it a lot more secure in many ways.

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

(With WordPress, a huge volunteer community of web developers is responsible for keeping the code maintained and updated. Screenshot source: make.wordpress.org)

WordPress continually evolves through the effort of a huge volunteer community working around the clock to fix any issues detected by users. Everyone benefits from hundreds of web developers, designers and users who are dedicated to improving the software, fixing bugs and making WordPress safer for every user …

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

As soon as a security vulnerability is discovered by developers or users, these are reported in user forums and addressed by the WordPress core developers …

(WordPress is continually being improved upon by a global community community of web developers and users. Image source: make.wordpress.org)

The WordPress community support system is very responsive and anybody can contribute to the process of addressing vulnerabilities.

For example:

• If you find bugs or a security exploit, you can report these by notifying security@wordpress.org.
• If you find any issues in a WordPress plugin, you can also report these by notifying plugins@wordpress.org.

This is why the core development team is constantly releasing new updates, and why you need to keep your site frequently updated …

(WordPress frequently releases new version updates to plug security exploits)

WordPress CMS Vs Proprietary CMS Platforms

Compare what we have just discussed above 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 quickly understand the value of using WordPress to run your business presence online on a secure platform.

WordPress is 100% free to download, modify and use, and hundreds of volunteers and expert developers are continually working to improve the technology. Can a proprietary technology company afford to employ as many developers and programmers and still deliver you software that is 100% free to download, use and modify as you wish?

WordPress CMS Vs Other Open Source Applications

(CMS Platforms)

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

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

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

Other research shows that, because WordPress is easy to use and to keep updated, when sites using different CMS platforms were tested for security vulnerabilities, WordPress sites had fewer exposure to risk …

(BlogDefender.com – CMS Tests. Screenshot image: BlogDefender.com)

It’s Easier To Blame Technology When Things Go Wrong

If someone compromises the security of your WordPress site, don’t be quick to place the blame on the WordPress CMS platform.

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

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

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

Of more immediate concern, however, is the fact that most security issues seem to be related to site owners forgetting to update their CMS software to the latest version …

(Many WordPress sites use outdated versions. Image 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 70% – 80% percent of all security issues are found in plug-ins and extensions …

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

Like many modern web platforms, WordPress is regularly updated in order to deal with new security threats that can arise. Improving software security is an ongoing concern, and to that end, you should always keep your WordPress software, plugins, and themes updated to the latest version.

WordPress Is Used By Many Security-Conscious Organizations!

The amount of misinformation about how secure WordPress is has even led the co-founder of WordPress, Matt Mullenweg, to chime into the online debate.

In a post 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 use WordPress to build their web presence, including banks, leading brands, and e-commerce sites, not just bloggers.

Other Issues Affecting WordPress Security

Other research on issues that affect WordPress security point to areas such as:

• No platform is completely safe from hacking. As many as 90% of all websites across all platforms are vulnerable to attack, mostly due to using outdated software.
• The main security threat of all content management platforms seems to be the users themselves. An example of this is users ignoring strong password security practices.
• Lack of constant system monitoring. Security systems need to be regularly monitored, tested, updated and improved.
• Webhosting setup. For example, websites on shared hosting are only as safe as the least secure site on the hosting grid, so if someone else on your shared server gets their site broken into, then every site on the server is potentially vulnerable.

There’s No Reason To Avoid Choosing WordPress

As this article has hopefully shown, WordPress is a secure web platform. As long as you commit to implementing basic web security measures (which all website owners should do, regardless of their technology platform) and keep your WordPress software (and themes, plugins, etc.) regularly up-to-date, there’s no reason to avoid choosing 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:  How To Help Prevent Brute Force Attacks On WordPress

A vulnerable web site provides hackers with a platform for launching distributed attacks, spreading malware and as a source of information theft. Blog Defender Security Plugin for WordPress makes your WordPress site invisible to botnet and hacker attacks. Learn more about it here:

• Protect Your WP Website From Bots And Hackers With Blog Defender Security Plugin

If you are currently using an outdated version of WordPress remember to back up your website before updating your software to benefit from the latest security updates. This way, if something goes wrong, you can always restore your site to its previous configuration.

If you don’t want to back up your files manually, there are many WordPress plugins you can use. You can read about a WordPress backup plugin that can fully automate your site backups here: Back Up, Duplicate And Keep Your WordPress Sites Protected With Backup Creator Plugin For WP

References

The above statistics were referenced from various sources, including those listed below:

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

Hopefully, the above post has given you a better understanding of issues that can affect your website and how WordPress can help you build a better business online. To learn more about using WordPress 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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