Regular reader K.K. emailed me a few days ago about WordPress websites being attacked by hackers. It sounded quite bad, however at the time I didn’t realise how bad the attack was as there are reports of WordPress websites being attacked frequently.
The figures that CloudFlare have reported are frightening. Their CEO Matthew Prince reported that hackers control about 100,000 bots. He also reported that they had seen attacks on every single website on their network. That’s a scary statistic.
Older WordPress websites which still use the admin username are more susceptible to attack, as they are using a dictionary attack to decipher passwords. The easier your password is, the more likely your WordPress website will be attacked.
To stop reduce the chances of your website being hacked, you should ensure that you are using complicated passwords using lowercase letters, uppercase letters, numbers, and characters. I also recommend installing a few security plugins such as login lockdown, Limit Login Attempts, Wordfence and Better WP Security.
This is a stark reminder that you should never take the security of your website lightly. Be proactive about security and you will reduce the odds of your website being attacked.
Kevin