In early 2013 a worldwide brute-force attack struck WordPress installations across virtually every WP host server in existence around the world.

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

(WordPress powers millions of sites around the world, making it a natural target for malicious attempts by hackers)

On March 11, 2014, technology sites began reporting that 160,000+ WordPress-powered websites had been hacked.

(160,000+ WordPress sites were attacked in a massive DDoS attack in early 2014. Image 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 WordPress web sites and direct a distributed-denial-of-service attack (DDoS) towards another popular website.

When global brute-force attacks happen on WordPress sites, it’s natural for website owners to start questioning just how secure WordPress is as a software for building and running their sites.

WordPress is frequently the target of attacks by hackers. But do you really need to be concerned about WordPress as being a secure platform for building your business website?

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

WordPress Security Explained

Let’s start by looking at facts …

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

The scale of attacks on websites and blogs around the world is increasing on a daily basis, and the situation is only going to get worse.

It’s probably safe to assume that if you haven’t been hacked yet, then it’s only a matter of time … regardless of the web platform you use!

Since it’s not a matter of if, but a matter of when before someone attempts to hack your website, are there any advantages that WordPress can offer you in terms of security?

Are “Open Source” Applications Really Safe?

Many people will often try and argue that WordPress should not be used for building and running a website or blog because it is a freely available open source software program.

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

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

(It’s not a matter of if, but a matter of when before your website is targeted by hackers … WordPress or no WordPress!)

While it’s true that WordPress is a free application and hackers can easily go through the code looking for security weaknesses and vulnerabilities that can be exploited (hackers can do the same with any program), the fact that WordPress is a free, open software platform actually makes it a whole lot more secure in many ways.

This is because WordPress is supported by an open community comprised of hundreds of software programmers, plugin developers and theme designers who are constantly working to help improve the program and make WordPress more secure …

(A large community of hundreds of developers around the world is responsible for building and updating the WordPress platform. Image: WordPress.org)

WordPress continually evolves through the effort of thousands of committed volunteers working around the clock to fix issues. It benefits from hundreds of minds committed to improving the application, fixing bugs and making the WordPress platform safer for every user …

(WordPress is built and maintained by an open community of contributors. Image source: WordPress.org)

The moment that any security problem is discovered by developers or users, the WordPress developers are then notified …

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

The WordPress community support system, therefore, is very responsive and anyone can help contribute to the process of getting bugs fixed.

For example:

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

This is why the core development team is constantly releasing new security updates, and why you continually need to keep your WordPress sites and blogs regularly updated …

(WordPress frequently releases new updates to address security holes)

WordPress Vs Proprietary CMS Applications

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

The WordPress CMS is free to download, use and modify, and hundreds of volunteers and expert developers work on improving the software. Can a proprietary CMS company afford to employ as many developers and programmers and still deliver users a free CMS platform that they can download, use and modify as they wish?

WordPress Vs Other Open Source CMS Platforms

(CMS Platforms include WordPress, Joomla and Drupal)

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

For example, here is one study showing the number of security vulnerabilities discovered in each of these open source CMS platforms …

(WordPress experiences less security vulnerabilities than other leading CMS applications. Screenshot image: National Vulnerability Database)

Other studies show that, because WordPress is easy to use and to update, when sites across different CMS platforms were tested for security exploits, sites run on WordPress had a significant degree of less exposure to risk …

(WordPress users are not as exposed to security exploits as other CMS platform users. Source: BlogDefender.com)

It’s Not WordPress’ Fault

Whenever WordPress sites are attacked en masse, users shouldn’t be quick to place the blame on the WordPress CMS platform.

According to security organizations Commtouch and StopBadware in a published report entitled “Compromised Websites: An Owner’s Perspective“, a large number of website owners have no idea about the threats their websites are exposed to, how to secure a website, or deal with compromised web security.

In fact, over 60% of webmasters surveyed in this report didn’t know how their sites were compromised after an attack …

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

Of immediate concern is the fact that many security-related problems come from site owners forgetting to update their CMS software to the latest version …

(Many WordPress users have not upgraded their WP sites. Source: Sucuri.net)

When WordPress security issues were examined in more detail, it was found that only around between 25% – 35% percent of vulnerabilities discovered in third-party code are actually found in the WordPress core software, while 65% – 85% percent of all security issues are found in plug-ins and developed externally for WordPress …

(WordPress Security Issues. Source: WebDesign.org)

Like many modern software applications, WordPress is regularly updated in order to address new security issues that could arise. Improving security is an ongoing concern, and to that end, you should always keep your WordPress site, plugins, and themes up-to-date.

WordPress Is Used By Many Security-Conscious Businesses!

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

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

Other Factors That Can Affect Security

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

• No platform is 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 security threat in all content management platforms seems to be the users themselves. For example, many users ignore strong password security recommendations.
• Lack of constant monitoring. All security processes require frequent monitoring, testing, updating and improvement.
• Server setup. For example, websites on shared webhosting servers are only as secure as the least secure website on the hosting grid, so if another user on your shared server gets their site broken into, then all sites on that server are potentially vulnerable to being hacked also.

There Is No Reason Not To Choose WordPress

As this article has hopefully shown, WordPress is as secure as most of the leading web platforms being used by businesses to build their presence online. As long as you remember to implement basic security measures and keep your WordPress software (and themes, plugins, etc.) regularly updated, there is really no reason to avoid using WordPress.

WordPress Security – Practical Tips

To learn about ways to protect your WordPress site from brute force attacks see this article:  How To Protect Your WordPress Website From Brute Force Attacks

An unsecured website provides hackers with a valuable resource to launch denial of service attacks, spread malware and engage in information theft. Blog Defender WordPress Security Plugin makes your WordPress site invisible to botnets and hackers. Go here to learn more:

• How To Prevent Malicious Cyber Attacks On Your WordPress Blog From Hackers And Botnets

If you are currently using an outdated WordPress version make sure you back up your site files and data before updating your software to benefit from the latest security updates. This way, if something goes wrong, you can always restore.

If you don’t want to perform manual backups, there are a number of plugins you can use. Learn about a WordPress backup plugin that can fully automate your backup process here: Backup, Clone & Protect Your WP Web Sites With Backup Creator WordPress Plugin

References

The above statistics were sourced from the following sites:

• 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 web site and how WordPress can help you get better business results online. To learn more about using WordPress for a business website or blog please click on links to visit other posts published on this site or subscribe to receive updates and notifications when new articles are published.

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