WordPress is often the target of malicious attacks by hackers, due to its global popularity.

In April 2013 a mass brute-force attack began hitting WordPress installations on virtually every web host in existence around the world.

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

How To Protect Your WordPress Site From A Brute-Force Attack

What Are Brute Force Attacks?

A brute-force attack is a technique used to break an encryption or authentication system by trying all possibilities.

(Source: Chinese University Of Hong Kong)

There are many methods hackers use to try and break into a WordPress site. One of these is by trying to guess the site’s administration login username and password. This can be achieved with scripts and software tools that automatically tries to guess hundreds of possible logins in minutes.

If you’re not using strong usernames or unguessable passwords, your website could be an easy target for hacking attempts.

This is called a “brute-force” attack.

What Are Botnets

A botnet is a number of Internet-connected computers communicating with other similar machines in an effort to complete repetitive tasks and objectives. This can be as mundane as keeping control of an Internet Relay Chat (IRC) channel, or it could be used to send spam email or participate in distributed denial-of-service attacks. The word botnet is a combination of the words robot and network.

(Source: Wikipedia/botnet)

A “Botnet” is a network of computers that have been infected with malicious software, which can then be controlled remotely as a group, typically without the unsuspecting computer owners even being aware that this is happening in their machine.

Botnets are normally used used to blast mass spam emails from the infected computers of unsuspecting users.

The screenshot below was taken from a site that monitors online security showing the locations of the command centers of ZeuS – a botnet that has been actively infecting computer networks all around the globe since 2009 …

(ZeuS is a botnet that has been actively compromising computer networks all around the world since 2009. Image: SecureList.com)

The botnet attacks were highly distributed and well organized. Over 90,000 IP addresses were identified by several webhosting companies in the initial attack, when the web was flooded with millions of attempts to force their way into WordPress user admin areas. The attack then continued, with over 30,000 WordPress sites and blogs being hacked every day.

Coverage of this brute force attack was widely reported in all of the major webhosting companiesand leading technology publications, such as TechNews Daily, Forbes, PC Magazine, Tech Crunch, BBC News, and even on the official US Department of Homeland Security website …

(Powering millions of sites around the world makes WordPress a target for hacking attacks)

Does This Mean WordPress Is Not Secure And We Should Stop Using It?

No. In fact, there are lots of great reasons why you should continue using WordPress if you are concerned about the security of your online business.

To understand why WordPress is a secure platform for websites, see this article: WordPress Security What Every Blog Owner Needs To Know

It’s important to note that, in the case of the brute force botnet attack described above, there was actually no WordPress vulnerability being exploited (the same script was also targeting sites built using applications like Joomla).

Mike Little, one of the co-founders of WordPress, said this about the brute force attacks:

It is a “simple” script that attempts to login using the admin login and a generated password. So if your password is too short or based on dictionary words it will be guessed and then the script can login legitimately and do whatever it wants including installing scripts (as plugins) or editing files. The attack tries to guess your password, if it succeeds, the most secure site in the world is wide open because they have your password.

(MikeLittle.org)

Preventing Your WordPress Site From Brute Force Attacks – Ten Security Measures

You may think that the information in your website or blog is of no interest to hackers, but the reality is that to a hacker, all websites provide an opportunity to benefit at your expense.

If a malicious user can discover a vulnerability that allows them to take over your site, the website or blog can then be used to target larger and more valued websites.

Additional undesirable effects of being hacked include being blacklisted by search engines, having spammy links promoting things like gambling, cheap offers on brand names, etc. in your content, redirecting visitors to phishing sites or other websites, drive-by downloads (adding malicious scripts on your visitors’ computers), and many other nasties.

The truth is that hackers are probably looking for weaknesses and trying to hack into your website at this very moment. Whether they can break into your site or not, depends on how hard or easy you have made it for them to continue trying until they can discover a way to get access, or are forced to give up and go look for a less secure target.

How Much Information Are You Broadcasting To Hackers About Your Site?

If you visit a site like Hackertarget.com and run your website through their WordPress security check …

(Website Security Check Screenshot source: Hackertarget.com)

You will see that the test returns various results and details about your site …

(Hackertarget – WP security scan results. Product image source: Hackertarget.com)

It should be obvious after using this tool that if you are able to freely access all of this information, then so can hackers.

(Screenshot image: Blog Defender)

Being able to see which version of WordPress you are using, which plugins and themes you have installed, and which files have been uploaded to certain directories are all useful information to hackers, as this informs them about any potential security vulnerabilities, especially where site owners haven’t updated their files.

If your site or blog runs on WordPress and you are not preventive steps to toughen up your site, then it’s practically guaranteed that, at some point in time, someone will attempt to hack your installation, because these brute force attacks are systematically hitting WordPress sites worldwide!

Whenever a website gets hacked, site owners can discover much to their dismay that they have been “locked out” of their own site, or notice that their files have been modified or even entirely wiped out. Often, most compromised sites will be infected with malicious software or viruses without the owner’s knowledge or awareness.

To avoid the heartache (and significant loss of valuable business data) that comes with discovering that your website or blog has been hacked into, we have listed below 10 essential and effective security measures that will help to prevent your WordPress site from being brute force attacked.

Note: A few of the recommended measures below require some technical understanding of how to modify core WordPress and/or server files. If you have no technical skills, or don’t want to mess around with code on your site, then ask your web host or a professional WordPress technical provider for assistance.

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Security Measure #1 – Get In Touch With Your Web Host

Get in touch with your web host and ask them what precautions they offer to help prevent your site from being attacked, and what is done to make sure that your server files get regularly backed up.

Check that your hosting provider is regularly backing up your sites and that, if anything happens, you can easily get back your site.

Security Measure #2 – Back Up Your WordPress Data And Files And Keep Your Site Frequently Maintained

Never rely on your webhosting service for your site backups. Instead, learn how to manage your WordPress site or pay someone to get this done for you and develop a habit of religiously performing a full site maintenance routine frequently (e.g. daily, weekly, fortnightly, etc …)

A full WordPress maintenance routine ensures that:

• All unnecessary files and data are deleted,
• All WP files and data are free of errors, optimized and backed up,
• All software, plugins and themes are up-to-date,
• etc …

A full WordPress maintenance routine looks like this …

(Maintaining your WordPress website backed up and up-to-date is vitally important for WordPress security. Screenshot: WPTrainMe.com)

Again, we cannot stress enough how vitally important it is to maintain your WordPress site frequently backed up and up-to-date. WP site maintenance is not hard or time-consuming, but it must be done to ensure the security of your website or blog. If you do not want to learn how to do WordPress maintenance yourself, get someone else to do it but make sure this gets done. Backing up your site is the second most important thing you should do after making sure that you are still breathing!

If you don’t want to perform manual backups, there are many free and paid WordPress plugins you can use. Learn about a WordPress backup plugin that can automate your site backups here: Back Up, Copy & Protect Your WordPress Websites With Backup Creator WordPress Plugin

Security Measure #3 – Do Not Use “Admin” As The Admin Username

the worldwide brute force attack on WordPress is mostly attempting to compromise website admin panels and gain access to the site by exploiting WordPress sites that used “admin” as the username.

For reasons of website security, don’t set up sites with the username “admin”. This is the first area of potential vulnerability hackers will test. If your site’s username is admin, then change this immediately.

We have created a tutorial for non-technical WordPress users that shows you how to change your username here: How To Change Your WP Admin Username

Security Measure #4 – Use A Strong Password

A “brute force” attack occurs when a malicious script continually and persistently hits a username and password field with different character strings trying to guess the right login combination that will give them access to your website.

Unless some measure is put into place to block the brute-force attack from happening (see further below for a couple of simple and effective ways to do this), the “bot” will just continue to attack your site until it eventually gets access.

Passwords that are easy to guess, therefore, make really easy targets for attacks. Make sure that you change your password to a string containing at least 8 characters long, with both upper and lowercase letters, combined with a few “special” characters (^%$#&@*).

You can use a password management program like Roboform to create hard-to-guess passwords …

(You can use a password program like Roboform to help you generate passwords)

We have created a simple step-by-step tutorial that shows you how to change your admin password here: What To Do If You Need To Reset Passwords

Security Measure #5 – Prevent The wp-config.php File From Being Accessed

The wp-config.php file contains information about your WP database and is used to define advanced WordPress options.

(wp-config.php file)

If a hacker breaks into your WordPress website, they will search for your wp-config.php file, because this is the file that contains important information about your site’s database, security keys, etc. Getting access to this information would allow a hacker to change anything in your database, create a user account, upload files and take control of your site.

In order to protect your WordPress site from being attacked and even being used as part of a bot net, therefore, you must prevent your wp-config.php file from being accessed. This requires knowing how to edit database information, move files around in your server and changing access permissions.

Security Measure #6 – Delete Or Rename Unnecessary Installation Files

Rename or delete your install.php, upgrade.php and readme.html files.

These files are not required after installation and can be deleted. If you don’t want to remove these files, then just rename them.

Security Measure #7 – Update Your WordPress CMS, Themes And Plugins

Hackers look for vulnerabilities in outdated versions of WordPress that they can exploit, including out-of-date versions of WordPress plugins and themes.

Make sure to keep your WordPress application files, plugins, themes, etc. up-to-date.

Security Measure #8 – Disable The WordPress Theme Editor

WordPress comes with a built-in editor that allows you to edit plugin and theme files inside the dashboard.

You can access the WordPress Theme Editor by selecting Appearance > Editor from your main menu …

(Accessing the WordPress theme editor via the WP dashboard menu)

The WordPress theme editor allows anyone accessing your blog to view and modify all of your WordPress theme template files, and cause havoc on your site.

To prevent unauthorized people from accessing your WordPress Theme editor, you will need to disable it. This can be done by adding code to your wp-config.php file.

Security Measure #9 – Remove Access To The WordPress Uploads Directory

The WordPress “uploads” directory contains all the media that gets uploaded to your blog.

Normally, this folder is visible to anyone online. All someone has to do to view all of the contents in your “uploads” directory is visit your directory using a web browser …

(WordPress uploads directory)

If any files stored in his folder have vulnerabilities that can be exploited by malicious users, someone can upload unauthorized file types or compromise the security of your website.

Protecting your directories will prevent unauthorized people from viewing your ‘uploads’ folder and other important directories. This can be done using plugins, setting file permissions, uploading a blank index.php file (this is literally a blank file called “index.php”) to your uploads directory, and so on. Again, it’s best to consult a professional if you are unsure about what to do.

Security Measure #10 – WordPress Security Plugins

There are several security plugins for WordPress available that will address many common security issues WordPress website owners face, such as preventing unauthorized users from accessing vital areas of your site, protecting your site from brute-force attacks, preventing unauthorized file uploads, etc.

Most WordPress plugins address some but not all areas of WordPress security. One security plugin that seems to do a comprehensive job of scanning, fixing and preventing potential issues that could lead to hackers accessing your site files and damaging your site is SecureScanPro.

(SecureScanPro – WordPress total security plugin)

SecureScanPro is easy to install and easy to use, and takes care of most of the security issues that WordPress users need to address.

Another plugin you may want to consider using is BlogDefender.

Blog Defender

(Blog Defender)

This product is a suite of WordPress security video tutorials, plugins and tools, plus WordPress security documentation in PDF and DOC formats.

BlogDefender scans you web site for security holes …

And then shows you how to fix these quickly …

If you don’t want to buy a security plugin like SecureScanPro or BlogDefender, then use various free WordPress plugins, such as Limit Login Attempts …

WordPress is a very secure platform, but neglecting simple maintenance tasks like keeping your WP software, WP plugins and WP themes updated to their latest versions, tightening file and data security and taking other necessary precautions can have disastrous consequences.

No matter what type of business you run or plan to run online and how small you think your web presence is, securing your website or blog is something you simply cannot ignore.

As a final reminder of the importance of keeping your websites protected, below is the advice given by an expert on web security to all WordPress users following the large-scale brute-force attacks by botnets on WordPress in 2013 …

Owners of websites based on WordPress CMS must improve at least basic security settings and implement best practices such as the use of robust passwords and the accurate management of “admin” accounts.

Pierluigi Paganini, Chief Information Security Officer, Security Affairs

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As you can see, website security is very important if you run a WordPress site. Hopefully, the information in this article has shown you what to do to prevent brute-force attacks on your WordPress site. If you need any further help or assistance with WordPress security, please seek help from a WordPress security specialist, or search for a professional WordPress technical provider in our WordPress Services Directory.

Also, remember subscribe to WPCompendium.org to receive notifications when we publish new articles on WordPress security and tutorials about new security plugins and solutions.

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