With the advent of platforms like Content Management Systems(CMS), owning a website is no longer a distant dream for a new internet user. With a user-friendly interface and array of choices of themes making your website attractive with varied website designs available, make it a winner all the way. 

In addition, taking care of all future changes to your website with easy-to-use features for, say, changes in content or design makes your life so simple.

With the ease of operation comes responsibility, that of maintaining the security of your website. WordPress is a CMS that has taken CMS popularity to the next level.

According to a study by W3Techs, WordPress takes a significant share of 41% among the world’s 10 million most visited websites, both using CMS or not. Also, among the CMS platforms, WordPress takes the top market share of 64.7%. 

But at the same time, WordPress websites have seen the most cyberattacks too. 

WordPress is indeed a safe platform with hardened security features. Still, sometimes users’ lousy security practices like the use of outdated WP and plugin versions and availability of a wide array of plugins with its vulnerabilities contribute majorly to the high rate of cyberattacks it faces.

So let us try to focus on some straightforward yet effective security hacks. After that, you will achieve a very high degree of WordPress website security and be ready to protect your website against any potential cyber threats.

Select a Reputed and Good Hosting Provider

You must invest in a good hosting provider that has the most robust security policy in place. 

Research well and settle for a reputed hosting provider that gives you a competitive and reasonable offer on plans along with security features like DDOS protection, automatic software updates that include security software, WordPress, operating system, etc. 

Most importantly, check if the hosting provider supports WordPress and has a hardened WordPress Firewall in place.

An essential security feature that you must pay attention to is that the host server must have a valid WP account and website management. In addition, it should have an architecture such that each one of the WP accounts is isolated from the other to eliminate any risk of cross-contamination in case of any attack.

If you choose a reputed hosting provider, you have an additional gain of fast and reliable service.

Secure Your WP Site with SSL Certificate

Whether or not your website is handling transactions or sensitive user’s information, it does not matter; securing all types of websites with an SSL Certificate is imperative. 

Google also, as policy, gives a better ranking to an SSL secured website on its Google search engine result pages. 

You can acquire an SSL Certificate for your WordPress website and ensure encryption of all the communications exchanged between the user web browser and the webserver. 

This protects user’s crucial information from getting into the hands of hackers through cyberattacks like Man-in-the-middle attacks.

After the website is secured with an SSL Certificate, the website’s protocol changes from HTTP to secured HTTPS, a visual symbol of trust. In addition, a padlock is added to the URL of the website, which helps gain the visitors’ trust. 

Thus, SSL Certificate not just secures your WordPress website but also carries out authentication of the website. With a wide variety of SSL certs available in the market and at varying validation levels, one often gets confused regarding the perfect choice of SSL certificate for your website. 

If your website has multiple first-level subdomains under the main domain you need to secure, such as payment, blog page, etc., – we recommend going for a wildcard SSL certificate. Are you worried about the costs, burning a hole in your pocket? That is no longer a concern because many premium yet cheap SSL certificates are available in the cybersecurity market. 

Use Of Nulled Themes Should Be Discouraged

WordPress offers some very attractive, premium themes with round-the-clock support, highly customizable themes with no restrictions but can prove a little expensive. 

Taking advantage of their interest in these premium themes but not so affordable costing, nulled WP themes have found a place in the pirated WP themes market. 

Just for saving a few bucks, you should never compromise on the safety of your website and go for cracked or nulled premium WordPress themes sold by some sites illegally. 

These nulled themes carry a very high risk of malware contamination. They contain some malicious codes that can infiltrate your configuration files and cause havoc on your website.

Install a WordPress Security Plugin

It is nearly impossible for an average internet user to keep a close security check for malware on your website. So here come the WP Security Plugins like Sucuri, iThemes Security Pro, Jetpack Security, etc., to your rescue. 

It can take total charge of website security, including regular scans for malware and keeping a vigilant eye on any spurious activity taking place on your website. 

Any good plugin services may range from remote malware scanning, monitoring file security, security activities auditing, post–hack support, etc. All in all, WP Security Plugins improve your WP security and increase the user’s trust in your website.

Use Strong Password to Protect Your WP Account

Protecting the Login credential of your WP account with a strong password is most vital. If hackers can break through the admin account, the database and configuration files could be infected with malicious code, and then it can prove to be disastrous for the whole WP website. 

Hence, it would help if you used strong and long passwords with a good mix of lower- and upper-case characters, numbers, and special characters. 

In addition, changing passwords from time to time and limiting the number of login attempts can help you ward off brute force attacks to crack your login credentials.

But, creating strong passwords for multiple accounts and remembering them can be daunting for the users. The Password Managers give an effective solution to this like Password, LastPass, etc. 

They help you generate strong passwords, remember them for you, and keep them safe in a vault. Hence use of a Password manager is highly recommended.

File Editing Should Be Disabled

Through its code editor function provided on the dashboard, WordPress gives a way to edit your theme or plugin files. It can either be done by going to 

Appearance > Editor 

Or by accessing Plugin Editor under

Plugins > Editor

As shown in the image below.

But it is always advisable to disable file editor in WordPress. This can be a weak link. If hackers happen to infiltrate into your WP admin login, they can infect your theme and plugin files with a subtle malicious code that is very difficult to suspect unless it becomes a more significant threat to the security of your WP website.

So, to disable theme and plugin editor in WordPress, place the code below in your wp-config.php file or your theme’s functions.php.file

define(‘DISALLOW_FILE_EDIT,true);

This will disable the file editor in WP.

In conclusion, we can say that you need to be constantly vigilant as WordPress security is an ongoing process. However, equipped with the most effective hacks discussed above to improve your WP website security, you will be able to stay ahead of any potential security threats to your website.