When some information is stolen, at the time only the security measure is overlooked. We daily come across many reports related to security breaches, stolen funds in newspapers. In order to protect a site, internet and website security should be screwed. When the security level falls down, many hackers and criminals start to hack the website and extract valuable data from the database that might be sold in underground markets. Nowadays, most of the transactions are done through online, that’s why the security reasons have to be considered at most. So, in this situation how can one protect the business from such issues? By implementing plans and procedures, the protection can be given. Performing a Cyber Security Audit is the best way and implementing the results are recommended.

HTTPS

Hyper Text Transfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS) is a secured protocol that transfers sensitive information between the web server and website. This protocol adds an encryption Transport Layer Security (TLS) or a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) to the HTTP ensures added security from hackers to the users’ database. Adding secured protocol layers not only guarantees the security but also helps the search ranking as GOOGLE recently announced that HTTPS will be considered as a ranking factor.

Obscure Admin Directories:

Hackers’ easiest way to access your site data is by directly heading into the admin directories. Hackers use some scripts to scan directories to access your web server on names like “access”, “admin” and “login”. Most of the popular Content Management Systems give you total control over the names of directories and it is advised to rename the admin folder to avoid such invasion. Try to choose inconspicuous folder names and it would strictly be communicated only to your webmaster. This is a great method to avoid a potential breach. “Everything depends on reputation”, every business owner should know the above fact.

Error messages

Be aware of your error messages. Try to provide minimal errors to the users to avoid secrets leak on the server, for instance, Database passwords, API keys. You are not supposed to provide full exception details as they induce complex attacks like SQL injection easier. Always keep detailed errors in the server logs and show the needy information to the users.

Install security plugins

To enhance your website security, adding up security plugins prevent against hacking attempts. In Wordpress platform, you may find out free plugins such as iThemes and bulletproof security. The said security addresses prevent additional types of hacking attempts that may threaten your website

“Sitelock” is used in CMS managed sites or HTML pages which close the site security loopholes simply by monitoring malware against the active virus. If your website relies on such category, Sitelock should definitely be considered.

Maintain your platforms up-to-date

Keeping up-to-date scripts and platforms help in a huge way to protect the website. Since most of these tools are created as open source software programs, their easily available code can be used by the malicious hackers. Web hackers can overcome this code, searching for security loopholes that allow them to exploit any script weakness and to take control of the site. Say for instance if you have a website based on Wordpress, both the installed Wordpress and third party plugins are vulnerable to potential hacks. You should always have newest platform and script versions to reduce the hacking risks. Wordpress users can check the hacks quickly by doing login to their dashboard. Watch the update icon in the top left corner next to the site name. When you click it, you can access the Wordpress updates.

Hold secure passwords:

Secure passwords may seem simple, but it is more important. Try to figure out the truly secured password and the most common password is used as “123456” by many of the web administrators for easy remembrance, however the same can be easily hacked. So put effort to generate a secure password to shield your site. Using a mix of special characters, numbers and letters make your website more secure. You should not allow the hackers to guess the passwords. A weak password will make your site more vulnerable to attacks. So try to increase the password strength to shield your website form the hackers.

Restrict Login Attempts

“Limit login attempts” is a Wordpress plugin that enables you to limit the failed login attempts and even prohibit an IP for a few hours. Within this plug-in brute force attacks might be much harder to pull off. The hackers would need different proxies since the plug-in would keep on watching the IP address after failed login attempts. In this plug-in, all options are customizable because you can choose number of allowed login attempts, how long they are locked etc.,

Make often back up of your website:

It depends on how often your website is getting updated and at least a weekly backup is suggested. “Backup buddy” is a popular Wordpress paid plug-in that can able to restore your hacked website in few minutes. “Ready back up” is a free plug- in that allows the webmaster to create automated backups, send them to FTP or dropbox and restore them quickly. There are many positive feedbacks given by the users for the free plug-in.

Stop allowing uploads

It may be a fun to pat your visitors to share and upload the work which is an incredible risk. Do not allow the guests to upload data on your site unless you do not have a good security team. However, visitors can share their links, comments which will be a safe method.

Deploy Penetration Testing

A security professional will conduct the test to find the weak spots on the website. It is the major security protocol that enables a website to stay away from the hackers.

Hire a professional

When the website starts to grow, having a professional security team is vital especially if your website saves personal or financial information. Deploying an IT security will make your site with regular updates and information & choose the best web development company in your location; so they can solve the problem in the initial stage itself and keep your site from being abused