5 Key Signs Your WordPress Site is at Risk of Being Hacked
Read the full blog post and infographic at: http://bit.ly/5keysigns
Here are some basic indicators that your WordPress website is attractive to hackers. As well as signs that a threat actor may already be trying to hack into your site, using various types of malware.
1) Your Traffic Just Picked up Significantly
WordPress hackers love web traffic. The more traffic you have, the more a hacker will find your site to be an exciting target. A new website is even better because the hacker will assume your site lacks the security measures necessary to keep your website and data safe. They also, often rightly, assume that a large amount of traffic means a large number of people can be targeted to steal credit card data or infect other websites, and computers. Watch out for large increases in foreign traffic – these are often telling signs that your site has already been compromised.
2) You’ve Recently Experienced a Cyber Attack
If you're using WordPress to power you website and it has recently repelled a concerted attack, congratulations! Just know that the battle isn't over yet. Being targeted by one hacker is often the best warning sign that there are more hacking attempts to follow. Some attacks are automated, such as a phishing virus to infect your website and then use your website to infect other vulnerable sites. Or there are targeted ransomware attacks that use malware to send unsolicited emails containing links to pages on your website that are engineered to steal usernames, password and other sensitive data in the next step of the attack.
Experiencing one attack suggests that your website has something worth taking. There may even be a darknet flag planted on your website from the first attack marking your WordPress site as a future target. Even worse, that hack you thought you stopped may well have revealed the WordPress themes and plugins you're using which can help hackers find even more vulnerabilities. Did you know that outdated plugins are the leading source of WordPress hacks?
3) Your Network has Been Exposed to an Infection
Not all cybersecurity threats work the same way. A website or an email phishing attack are only two of many ways a threat actor can steal data. Having your network infected (i.e. using malware) is something that needs to be handled with even greater care. If compromised, the risk exists that your network has been sending messages or data back to the hacker to exploit.
Successful network malware attacks heighten your risk profile because it may be living in your workplace computers and devices and continue infecting each device that connects. It is possible to identify and route out a malware infection, but your data is now at far greater risk than ever before because of the infection. The compromise may have exposed your security vulnerability, created back doors for future attacks, or set a beacon to raid your website.
4) Your Website Host Was Recently Hacked
One of the biggest warning signs of all is if your website hosting company has recently experienced a breach. When hosting companies get hacked, everyone is put at risk because the hosting company has control over all of their clients websites and servers. Without a doubt, hosting companies go out of their way to compartmentalize servers to protect one infection source from putting the rest of their clients at risk. With that said, Hackers News reported in January of this year that five major web hosting companies had been hacked – putting millions of customers and billions of websites at risk.
Understandably, hosting companies are targeted directly by hackers or concerted groups of bad actors to steal treasure-troves of data and gain access to key websites. Usually, it's a smash-and-grab with data stolen along the way. But often, there are more insidious aspects to the hack.
If your host has recently reported a security breach, and you haven’t done so already, you need to speak with your host and developer to do everything you can to protect your website data.
5) A Cloud Business Partner Has Been Hacked
Finally, keep an eye on all the business partners from whom you buy cloud services. Whether it's widgets for the website, analytics tools, data storage, or useful utilities. Symantec recently reported a 200% increase in supply chain attacks that attempt to spread spying tools to a wider number of companies.
If your account with a cloud services partner has been compromised, it may only be a matter of time before the stolen data leads them to target your website, network or other services as a result. If this happens take immediate steps to protect yourself, including a change of all your passwords – everywhere! Use strong passwords and password management.
Why? Because hackers love to follow up on their attacks. As data thieves, they can make the most of what they take by selling sensitive data or cultivating the data for their own purposes.