The scale of attacks on websites and blogs worldwide is rising, and this is only going to get worse.
It’s safe to assume that if you haven’t been hacked yet, then it’s inevitable that at some point in time someone will attempt to hack into your site.
On March 11, 2014, technology sites like Cnet.com began reporting that over 162,000 WordPress-powered sites had been hacked.
Thousands of websites and blogs are hacked every year! Will yours be one of them?
(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 reported by security firm Sucuri, hackers had leveraged a well-known flaw to attack unsuspecting WordPress web sites and direct a distributed-denial-of-service cyber-attack (DDoS) towards another popular website.
Every web site with a vulnerability presents an opportunity to hackers. No website or blog is safe from being attacked by hackers. Large, medium and small business web sites, personal blogs, government web sites … even sites owned by online security experts can and have been targeted.
If someone can find a way to gain remote access of your site, that website or blog can then be used to attack other valued websites.
The reality is that malicious bots are very likely trying to hack into your web site while you are reading this page right now. Whether they can be successful depends on how difficult or easy you have made it for hackers and botnets to keep trying until they either can find how to break in, or are forced to give up and decide to look for a less protected 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 – WordPress Security Scan Image source: Hackertarget.com)
You will see that the scan returns a number of results and details about your website setup …
(WordPress security check results. Screenshot source: Hackertarget.com)
It should be obvious after using the above tool that if you can see all of this information, hackers can too.
(Source: BlogDefender.com)
The ability 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 in your site can all be potentially valuable information to hackers, as these can inform them about any exploitable vulnerabilities, especially in older versions.
Fortunately, there is a simple and inexpensive solution to stop broadcasting all of this information about your site and make your site invisible to malicious users and botnets.
Blog Defender Security Product Suite
Product Description
The product is a package of WordPress security video tutorials, plugins and tools, plus a WordPress security PDF/DOC file.
Matt Garrett, the developer of the BlogDefender security suit began to develop BlogDefender after noticing that a WordPress-driven blog he set up for his mother had been hacked into and suspended by its webhost. This blog had practically no value to offer, yet it still was hacked.
Matt only became aware of the event after being informed by his host and seeing that a significant amount of unusual activity had occurred within the site, as well as the addition of several malicious files by whoever had broken into the site.
(Product image: Blog Defender)
This simple example provides the valuable lesson that every website is valuable to hackers.
Blog Defender scans you web site for security weaknesses …
And then shows you how to easily fix these …
WordPress Plugins
The product suite comes with 3 plugins for WordPress:
Pro Plugin # 1 in the product suite helps you schedule automated backups …
(Source: BlogDefender website)
This plugin lets you do automated backups to your server, third-party servers and cloud-based storage solutions using a number of backup methods, schedule full or partial backups, exclude files or tables from your backups, restore backups, replace URLs (useful when migrating websites to different domains or server locations), search and replace text in your WordPress database, perform auto database scans and repairs, and more.
Plugin #2 “WP Security” provides WordPress security …
(Screenshot image: Blog Defender)
The “WordPress Security” plugin performs a range of site and file protection functions (see “Product Features” section below).
Plugin #3 lets you scan your files and content to detect whether your source code has been tampered with, and repair any problems found …
(Product image: BlogDefender website)
Pro Plugin # 3 also scans content to see if any malicious content have been inserted into your site files, bans bad bots, blocks brute force attacks and detects any content leeching (where people benefit from your work without offering any reciprocal benefit or value in return).
Blog Defender – Videos
In addition to the plugins, the Blog Defender suite of products also includes seven training modules in video format and PDF/DOC guides that will teach you exactly how to protect your site from malicious users …
(Screenshot: BlogDefender.com)
Learn more here:
Benefits
Below we have listed just some of the many benefits of using Blog Defender to make your WordPress site invisible to hackers and botnets on your website:
Fast Installation
The plugins included with Blog Defender install like any plugin. Just upload them to your Plugins folder via your WordPress dashboard and activate.
Simple And Easy To Follow Training
Blog Defender can be used as a DIY step-by-step training product that will guide you through the website security process and show you what to do, including how to set things up, and even which free WordPress plugins to install to get the job done.
Additional benefits of using the plugin include:
- Protect your site from hackers, spammers, botnets, data mining tools and malicious users attempting to exploit your site for their own personal and financial gain.
- Protect Your Info Products – If you’re an info product author (e.g. downloadable e-books, video training, etc.), your product can end up becoming freeware on download sharing sites.
- Avoid A Nightmare Situation – When a site has been hacked, you can expect to go through a serious amount of frustration and heartache. It can take days to uncover problems and sort through the issues these have caused. During this time, your, website could get suspended by your host, or even deindexed in search engines. And if this isn’t enough to have to deal with, your contacts could be spammed, your subscriber list and financial details could be stolen, you could be fined or even charged with fraud, and a whole lot more.
Plugin Features
Blog Defender make your your web site invisible to hackers and malicious bots.
Blog Defender helps you fix the following security areas:
- Hosting Security Advisory
- WP Plugin Security Audits
- WordPress Theme Security Audits
- Anti Brute Force Security
- Anti Cross-Site Scripting
- WordPress Database Security
- Nefarious Traffic Blocking
- Hiding WordPress ‘Tell Tale’ Signs
- Anti-Comment Spam Blocking
- Monitor Files
- Monitoring Links
- Known Offender Blocking
- Automating WordPress Updates
- WordPress Security Audit
- Tighten Server Security
- Kick Out Policy
- Reputation Checking
- And More …
Blog Defender follows a logical process for securing your web site, addressing potential hosting security issues, using tools to quickly identify risky WP themes and plugins, and then helping you implement site-wide security using the tools and plugins provided.
(Blog Defender WordPress security process. Screenshot image: Blog Defender)
User Feedback
Below are a few of the testimonials and comments that users have written about Blog Defender:
“You are literally walked through the process!” Nikki Stephens, www.nikkistephens.com
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”A top level force against hacker attacks!” Micheal Nicholas, Impact Info Marketing
Plugin Tips
According to the plugin developer, no Blog Defender-secured websites were hacked since Blog Defender’s release.
Matt also states on his site …
“With the volume of attacks nowadays … we probably won’t hold forever, so we’ve been busy creating even tougher WordPress security.”
Cybersecurity is is a never-ending game of cat and mouse and all security solutions are only as good as the knowledge and technologies that developers can currently harness. The latest release of Blog Defender provides users with an easier security solution that doesn’t require constant attention, is quite inexpensive and it’s as good if not better than many 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 no-risk, thirty day, complete money-back guarantee.
Plugin Pricing
Blog Defender is normally available for personal use only on unlimited sites. When we last checked, however, it was also being sold with Developer rights, allowing users to secure client sites as well.. Cost = $47.00.
Please Note: The cost to purchase the product depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. The above reflects the current price when this review was written. This may or may not be the actual price charged by the product author when you visit the product site and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing:
Additional Information
For help documentation and tutorials, FAQs, customer helpdesk, contact details and more, visit the Blog Defender website.
In Conclusion
Regardless of the kind of business you run or plan to run online and how small you think your web presence is, you cannot ignore the importance of web security.
WordPress is a very secure web platform, but neglecting essential maintenance tasks like keeping your WP core files, WP plugins and WP themes up-to-date, tightening file and data protection and taking other necessary precautions can expose your website to attacks by hackers and bots.
Blog Defender helps you understand what your security responsibilities as a website owner are, what hosting companies can and can’t do to help prevent your sites being hacked, 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 Security Product Suite For WordPress
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