Around 30,000 websites are targeted by hackers every day. Hacked sites end up with with large banners displayed, or site owners have a warning notice from Google. Some are easy 30 minute fixes, others take several hours. Here’s what we’ve discovered:
Some were caused by security issues on the site itself with poor setup, bad themes or plugins, allowing the intruder access to upload their own nasty files.
Other times it’s security issues at the host server end that allows the intruders in to corrupt the site. This most often occurs with the budget shared hosts. What annoys me when this happens, is that the host company will often shut your website down, even though the core reason for the hacker getting in, was nothing you did wrong, but poor security and/or old technology used by the host company itself!
Unlike a home PC, there’s no magical anti-virus package to prevent all this, since the reasons a site gets hacked are many and varied… And the effectiveness of security plugins and emphasis on strong passwords isn’t enough. Here’s the top reasons WordPress sites get hacked:
- 41% are hacked through a security vulnerability on their hosting platform
- 29% were hacked via a security issue in the WordPress theme they were using
- 22% were hacked via a security issue in the WordPress plugins they were using
- 8% were hacked because they had a weak password
We provide site audits and full repairs for hacked sites. Repaired sites are security-hardened and with essential backup systems added. For a quote, fill in the form below
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For more background on WordPress, Hosting and Security, visit our meetup group site.