In early 2013 a global brute force attack began hitting WordPress installations on virtually every host server in existence around the world.

These attacks were caused by botnets (computer networks infected with malware and programmed to attack other installations).

(WordPress is often the target of malicious attacks by hackers)

On March 11, 2014, technology sites reported that 162,000 WordPress-powered websites had been hacked.

(Over 160,000 WordPress sites were attacked in a massive DDoS attack in early 2014. Image source: BlogDefender.com)

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 sites and direct a distributed-denial-of-service attack (DDoS) towards another popular website.

When brute force attacks on WordPress sites are reported in the media, it’s natural for people to start questioning if WordPress really is a secure platform for running their websites.

Being the world’s most popular content management system makes WordPress an obvious target for attempted hacker attacks. But should you be concerned about WordPress as being a secure platform for building your business web presence?

In this article, you will learn some of the main reasons why you should choose WordPress if you are concerned 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 massive, and things are getting 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 … regardless of the web platform you use!

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

Is “Open Source” Software Really Safe?

Some people will often argue that WordPress cannot be a safe platform for building and running a website or blog because its open source code means that anyone can view how the software program was built.

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

The argument against WordPress, then, goes something like this: If everyone can study the Open Source code for WordPress, then hackers can easily obtain the code and go through it in great detail, searching for weaknesses and vulnerabilities they could exploit …

(It’s no longer a matter of if, but when before a malicious user attempts to hack your website … WordPress or no WordPress!)

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

This is because WordPress has the support of a global community that consists of thousands of people such as software programmers, plugin developers and theme designers who constantly help to improve the platform and make WordPress more secure …

(A large volunteer community of thousands of developers around the world maintain and update. Source: WordPress.org)

WordPress continually evolves through the effort of hundreds of committed volunteers working around the clock to fix issues. It benefits from thousands of web developers, designers and users who, at any one time, are focused on improving the code, fixing bugs and making WordPress safer for every user …

(WordPress is built and maintained by a large community of contributors. Screenshot: WordPress.org)

The moment that any security issue is discovered by developers or users, the WordPress core developers are then made aware of it …

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

The WordPress community support system is quite formidable and anyone can help contribute to fixing the software.

For example:

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

This is the reason why the WordPress team is constantly releasing new version updates, and why you need to keep your WordPress sites and blogs frequently up-to-date …

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

WordPress Vs Proprietary CMS Platforms

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 improve platform security. By contrast, a proprietary or “closed-source” software application would normally be built by a small team of developers with limited time and resources to provide continuous security monitoring, support, bug fixes and updates.

WordPress is 100% free to download, modify and use, and thousands of volunteers and expert developers work on improving the platform. Can a proprietary CMS company afford to employ as many developers and programmers and still deliver users software that is 100% free to download, use and modify as they wish?

WordPress CMS Vs Other Open Source CMS Applications

(CMS Platforms include WordPress, Joomla and Drupal)

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

For example, here is one study showing the number of security vulnerabilities found in popular platforms during a certain period …

(WordPress experiences fewer security vulnerabilities than other leading CMS applications. Image: National Vulnerability Database)

Other research indicates that, because WordPress is quite easy to use and update, when sites using different CMS platforms were tested for security exploits, WordPress sites had fewer exposure to risk …

(WordPress users are less exposed to threats than other CMS platform users. Source: 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 blame 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 webmasters are not fully aware of the threats their websites are exposed to, how to properly secure a website, or how to deal with compromised web security.

In fact, over sixty percent of webmasters surveyed for the report didn’t know how their sites were compromised after an attack …

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

Of more immediate concern for WordPress users, is the fact that most security issues seem to be related to users forgetting to update their WordPress software to the latest version …

(Many WordPress users have not updated their software. Source: Sucuri.net)

When WordPress security issues were examined in more detail, it was found that only around between 20% – 35% percent of vulnerabilities discovered in 3rd-party code are found in the WordPress CMS core, while most security issues are found in plug-ins and developed externally …

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

Like all robust web applications, WordPress is regularly updated to deal with new security vulnerabilities that may arise. Improving software security is an ongoing 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 caused the co-founder of WordPress, Matt Mullenweg, to chime into the online discussion.

In a post entitled “A Bank Website on WordPress” published 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, including banks, large organizations and e-commerce sites use WordPress to build their presence online, not just bloggers.

Other Areas Affecting Security

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

• No platform is safe from hackers. As many as 90% of all websites across all platforms are vulnerable to attack, mostly due to using software that is out of date.
• The main security weakness in all content management systems seems to be the users themselves. An example of this is users ignoring good password security recommendations.
• Lack of constant monitoring. Security systems need to be constantly monitored, tested, updated and improved.
• Webhosting server setup. For example, websites on shared webhosting servers are only as safe as the least secure site on the hosting grid, so if another user on your shared server gets their site broken into, then every site on that server becomes vulnerable.

There Is No Reason To Avoid Using WordPress

As this article has hopefully shown, WordPress is quite secure. As long as you continue to implement basic security measures and keep your WordPress software (and themes, plugins, etc.) updated, there’s no reason not to choose 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:  Preventing WordPress Brute Force Attacks

A vulnerable web site presents malicious users with a valuable resource to launch distributed attacks, spread malware and engage in information theft. Blog Defender Security Plugin for WordPress Websites makes your WordPress site invisible to bots and hackers. Learn more about this plugin here:

• Prevent Malicious Intrusions On Your WP Web Site From Hackers

If you are using older versions of WordPress make sure to back up your site fully before updating your software to benefit from the latest security updates. This way, if things don’t go as planned, you can always restore.

If you don’t want to perform manual backups, there are many plugins you can use. You can read about a WordPress backup plugin that can fully automate your site backups here: Back Up, Clone & Keep Your WP Websites And Blogs Protected With Backup Creator WP Plugin

References

For more information on the above, refer to the sites below:

• 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 get better results online. To learn more about the security benefits of using WordPress please click on links to visit our related posts section or subscribe to receive updates and notifications whenever new articles or tutorials are published.

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