In April 2013 a global brute force attack hit WordPress installations on virtually every WP host server in existence around the world.

These attacks were caused by botnets (computers infected with malware and programmed to attack other computers with security vulnerabilities).

(WordPress powers millions of sites around the world, which makes it a target for attempted attacks by hackers)

In March 2014, many technology sites reported that over 162,000 WordPress-powered sites had been hacked.

(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)

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

When worldwide attacks happen on WordPress sites, it’s natural for people to start questioning just how safe and secure WordPress is as a software for building and running an online presence.

WordPress is the world’s most used content management system which makes it an obvious target for hackers. But should you really be concerned about WordPress as being a secure platform for building your business presence online?

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

WordPress Security Explained

Let’s start with 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.

It’s probably safe to assume that if your website or blog hasn’t been hacked yet, then it’s only a matter of time … regardless of the web platform your website has been built with!

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

How Vulnerable Are “Open Source” Applications?

Many people will often try and argue that WordPress is not a secure platform for running websites because it’s an “open source” and freely available program.

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

The argument, then, goes something like this: If everyone can study the Open Source code for WordPress, then hackers can also easily get hold of the code and study every line, looking for security vulnerabilities in the code that they could exploit …

(It’s no longer a matter of if, but a matter of when before your website is targeted by malicious hackers … WordPress or no WordPress!)

While it’s true that WordPress is free to download and hackers can easily access it and study the code looking for security holes and weaknesses (hackers can do the same with any software program), 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 community that consists of thousands of software programmers, plugin developers and theme designers who constantly help improve the program and make WordPress more secure …

(A global volunteer community of web developers is responsible for maintaining and updating WordPress. Screenshot image: make.wordpress.org)

WordPress continually evolves through the effort of a huge community working around the clock to fix issues. It benefits from hundreds of minds who, at any one time, are focused on improving the application, identifying and fixing security vulnerabilities and making the WordPress platform safer for every user …

(The WordPress core software is built by a global community of users. Image: WordPress.org)

The moment any security weaknesses are identified by developers or users, the WordPress development team are then notified …

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

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

For example:

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

This is one of the reasons why the WordPress community releases new updates regularly, and why you need to keep your sites and blogs regularly up-to-date …

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

WordPress CMS Vs Proprietary CMS Applications

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

WordPress is free to download, modify and use, and thousands of volunteers and expert developers work on improving the technology. Can a proprietary CMS 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 safer than other leading Open Source CMS platforms like Drupal and Joomla.

For example, here is one study showing how many security vulnerabilities were found in popular open source platforms during a given period …

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

Other studies also indicate that, because WordPress is easy to use and keep updated, when sites across different CMS platforms were tested for security exploits, sites run on WordPress had less exposure to risk …

(Blog Defender – CMS Tests. Screenshot source: BlogDefender.com)

WordPress Is Not Always To Blame

If someone breaks into your WordPress site, don’t be too quick to place the blame on WordPress.

According to a report called “Compromised Websites: An Owner’s Perspective,” which is published by security vendor Commtouch and StopBadware, a nonprofit organization that helps webmasters identify, remediate and prevent website compromises, a large number of website owners are not fully aware of the threats their websites are exposed to, how to properly secure a website, or deal with security compromises.

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

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

Of immediate concern is the fact that many security-related problems arise from users running WordPress on outdated versions of the software …

(Many security issues come from sites running an outdated version of WordPress. Screenshot image: 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 CMS core, while 70% – 75% percent of all security issues are found in plug-ins and extensions …

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

Like many web platforms, WordPress is updated regularly in order to address new security problems that may 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.

WordPress Is Used By Many Security-Conscious Organizations!

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

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

Other Areas Affecting WP Blog Security

Other research on issues that play a role in WordPress security point to things such as:

• No platform is completely safe from security threats. As many as 90% of all websites across all platforms are vulnerable to being attacked, mostly due to using outdated software.
• The main risk 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 system monitoring. Security systems need to be frequently monitored, tested, updated and improved.
• Hosting server setup. For example, sites on shared hosting are only as safe as the least secure site on the grid, so if another user has a weak FTP password on your shared server, then all sites on the server are potentially vulnerable.

There Is No Reason To Avoid Choosing WordPress

As this article has hopefully shown, WordPress is as secure as most other leading web platforms being used by businesses to build their presence online. As long as you continue to implement basic web security measures (which all website owners should do) and keep your WordPress software (and plugins, themes, etc.) regularly updated, there is no reason to avoid choosing WordPress.

WordPress Security – Practical 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 offers hackers with a resource for launching denial of service attacks, spreading malware and engaging in information theft. Blog Defender WordPress Security Plugin makes your WordPress site invisible to hackers and bots. Go here to learn more:

• How To Prevent Malicious Intrusions On Your WP Websites By Hackers

If you are currently using an outdated WordPress version make sure you back up your site fully before updating your software to protect your site from the latest security risks. This way, if something goes wrong, you can always restore things back to their former configuration.

If you don’t want to perform manual backups, there are a number of free and paid plugins you can use. You can read about a WordPress backup plugin that can automate your backup process here: Backup, Duplicate & Protect Your WordPress Websites With Backup Creator WordPress Plugin

References Used In This Article

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, now you have a better understanding of problems that can affect your web site and how WordPress can help you improve your business online. To learn more about using WordPress for a business web site 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.

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