Are you overwhelmed by the numerous plugins and security services available to choose from to secure your WordPress site from hackers?

Websites have become a playground for hackers to exploit critical flaws and vulnerabilities to perform unauthorized actions. WordPress sites are a common target due to its popularity and use by millions around the world.

An insecure WordPress site that uses weak passwords, operates outdated plugins, and themes, increases the risk of being attacked by hackers.

Your website can never be too secure. Having a layered security approach will strengthen website protection of your site.

These five essential plugins for online businesses will get you started on securing your WordPress website.

First Things First WP Nerds

The first thing a bot does when trying to access your website is to brute force your account login settings. What does the term “brute force” means?

A brute force attack consists of a trial and error of guessing possible combinations of login information.

Weak and guessable username and passwords credentials, such as “admin” and “123456”, dictionary words, common names, and personal information are what make brute force attacks popular.

It’s not uncommon for users to use “admin” as both the username and password.

The amount of time it takes to crack “123456” is 0 seconds. How long does it take to break “admin”? 0.03 seconds.

Take the password challenge and test your password strength.

If your account login username is using the default name “admin”, a hacker just needs to guess your password to gain access to your WordPress admin area and files.

Ensure to change your admin account login name from the default user name “admin” or “administrator” to something a name that is difficult to guess and isn’t the same name as your website domain.

5 Essential WordPress Plugins

Jetpack by WordPress.com

Jetpack provides 24/7 security protection from brute-force attacks (unauthorized logins) by scanning for malware and blocking malicious attacks on your site. Spam filtering detects and blocks unsolicited comments.

WP Security

The All In One WordPress Security plugin uses a security points system to gauge how secure your site is by taking you through the following general settings:

• User Accounts

• User Login

• User Registration

• Database Security

• Filesystem Security

• Blacklist Manager

• Firewall

• Brute Force

• SPAM Prevention

• Scanner

• Maintenance

Check out this WordPress tutorial by SERT Media for a step by step instruction on setting up the All In One WP Security & Firewall plugin.

Akismet

Akismet is an anti-spam WordPress plugin that checks your comments and contact form submissions for spam and stops malicious content from being published on your WordPress website.

The most common type of spam on your site is the contact page and comments sections on your blog page.

Spammers fill out the comment or message fields with random and annoying spam messages.

The good news is this plugin may come already installed on your WordPress. If not, just go to your WP dashboard. Click ‘Add New’ plugins and search for ‘Akismet Anti-Spam.’

Cloudflare

In addition to speeding up your website, Cloudflare provides a go-between your website and the webserver. Oh, did I mention securing your website with Cloudfare is free?

You can think of Cloudflare as the first line of defense. When users visit your site, they will first pass-through the Cloudflare network before a request is sent to your web host.

If you have ever visited a club, the first person you see is a bouncer at the front door vetting guests by checking IDs.

There is always someone trying to figure out ways to get past the bouncer with trickery and fake outs.

The individual knows they are not supposed to be there but will give the desperate tactic of sneaking in through the back exit a try. It’s worth a shot, right?

The bouncer tells all the other bouncers to be on the look for a person matching a description trying to sneak into the club.

Just like bouncers, Cloudflare works to keeps the bad guys (malicious actors) out of the club (their network).

Without Cloudflare, your website is naked, subject to slow page speed, bots, and hackers attempting to visit and conduct malicious activity.

WPS Hide Login

Protect and secure your WordPress admin area by hiding your wp-admin URL from being discovered by bots and hackers using the plugin WPS Hide Login.

You can change the URL to anything you want. Just make sure you can remember the name. How does it work you ask? Let me explain.

Everyone knows the very common URL wp-login.php. You don’t want just anybody knowing what your login page is.

The WPS Hide Login plugin hides your login page. When someone goes to your wp-login.php page, the visitor will be redirected to another page.

YouTube has a plethora of tutorials with step by step instructions on how to set it up this feature in less than a minute.

After securing your site, the next area of importance to visit your WordPress admin directory.

As I said earlier, Your website can never be too secure. Having a layered security approach will strengthen website protection of your site.

For more ways to secure your site, check out my post, 10 Online Security Tips, and remember always to use strong passwords.