Book Image

WordPress 3 Ultimate Security

Book Image

WordPress 3 Ultimate Security

Overview of this book

Most likely – today – some hacker tried to crack your WordPress site, its data and content – maybe once but, with automated tools, very likely dozens or hundreds of times. There's no silver bullet but if you want to cut the odds of a successful attack from practically inevitable to practically zero, read this book. WordPress 3 Ultimate Security shows you how to hack your site before someone else does. You'll uncover its weaknesses before sealing them off, securing your content and your day-to-day local-to-remote editorial process. This is more than some "10 Tips ..." guide. It's ultimate protection – because that's what you need. Survey your network, using the insight from this book to scan for and seal the holes before galvanizing the network with a rack of cool tools. Solid! The WordPress platform is only as safe as the weakest network link, administrator discipline, and your security knowledge. We'll cover the bases, underpinning your working process from any location, containing content, locking down the platform, your web files, the database, and the server. With that done, your ongoing security is infinitely more manageable. Covering deep-set security yet enjoyable to read, WordPress 3 Ultimate Security will multiply your understanding and fortify your site.
Table of Contents (23 chapters)
WordPress 3 Ultimate Security
Credits
About the Author
Acknowledgement
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Index

Locking down indirect access


As important as securing direct access to sites, is securing indirect access via the server.

We can figure out the attack routes easily enough because we use them too. Server login, FTP, MySQL clients like phpMyAdmin, and control panels are all targets for brute-forcing, and just like the more obvious WordPress login page, these need toughening up.

Server login

As far as the server goes, as we shall see, there's a whole lot more to securing the thing than creating a secure login process. This, though, is the natural starting point.

So what's the difference between server login and control panel login? The control panel is simply a software package, a set of tools that helps us to tweak settings and run tasks in a user-friendly way. The control panel sits on the server, just like other helpful GUIs such as file browsers or database managers.

The level of server access we have depends on the kind of hosting plan we bought, but you may be surprised, even decent shared...