INTRO TOSECURITY

(BEGINNERS EDITION)Michele Butcher

CantSpeakGeek.com WPSecurityLock.com

@Michele_Butcher

Slides can be found at http://mlb.pw/wcstl2015

MICHELE BUTCHER• WordPress Specialist, Site

Cleaner, and Trainer for WP Security Lock

• WordPress Specialist for Megabytes Inc

• One Woman Wonder at Can’t Speak Geek

@michele_butcher

WHY IS SECURITY IMPORTANT?

@michele_butcher

EVERY DAY HACKERS TRY TO FIND WAYS TO GET YOUR

INFORMATION.

@michele_butcher

WHY DO HACKERS HACK?• Make bank

• Build a zombie site army

• Share their nasty malware with the world

• Get your information

• They are bored

• They want to see if they can do it@michele_butcher

WHY ARE THESE PEOPLE ATTACKING ME?

Anymore, it is not people but bots attacking your site. Hackers have programs that do the work for them.

Rarely is it people doing the hacking unless it is targeted. Strong opinion sites are a good example.

@michele_butcher

HOW DO THEY GET IN?• Guess your login. If you know it so can someone else. (Brute

force attack or man in the middle)

• Denial of Service attack (DDoS) flood your site with more traffic than it can handle

• Through a theme, file or plugin

• Through your FTP or CPanel. (Files set to read, write,execute. Brute force, anonymous login, shared hosting infection)

@michele_butcher

AND NOW FOR THE ONLY THING SCARY THAT I AM

GOING TO SAY.

@michele_butcher

YOU ARE NEVER 100% SECURE

@michele_butcher

EVEN A TEST SITE OR A KNITTING SITE WITH ONLY 2 VISITORS CAN BE HACKED. IT CAN HAPPEN TO YOUR SITE.

@michele_butcher

It has happened to me, it can happen to you.

DON’T LET SECURITY MAKE

YOU LIKE THIS GUY.

@michele_butcher

NEVER FEAR…THERE ARE WAYS TO KEEP THE

HACKER ATTACKERS OUT!

@michele_butcher

I promise it is not all that painful!

WORDPRESS SECURITY BASICS

@michele_butcher

NEVER EVER EVER USE ADMIN AS USER NAME OR PASSWORD AS

PASSWORD.NEVER!

@michele_butcher

Got it?

ALWAYS CHANGE YOUR PREFIX NAME FROM WP_ LET IT BE ANYTHING

OTHER THAN WP_FDHSFJKHS_ IS ALWAYS GOOD

I typically do not even look at what I am typing anymore when I make the WP prefix. The random the better.

@michele_butcher

WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU HAVE TEMPORARY

PEOPLE IN YOUR DASHBOARD

@michele_butcher

ALWAYS USE SFTP

Regular FTP is not secure. Do not use it unless the server is only set up for FTP.

Only give them access to what they NEED not what they want.

Just because they want to be an admin does not automatically make them one.

Guest bloggers should not be anymore than a contributor.

If it is only a temporary login, delete their login when they have completed their job.

If they have posts on your site, you can knock them down to subscribers so they can not change anything on your site.

If they are only doing work, delete them when their job is done.

Set up a file change detection notification to know what they are

changing in your site.

iThemes Security and other security plugins give you the option to see what all users are

doing when logged into the dashboard.

WHAT ABOUT SECURITY PLUGINS?

@michele_butcher

ITHEMES SECURITY PRO

Great all encompassing best practices WordPress security plugin.

Two versions a free and a premium.

http://ithemes.com/security

@michele_butcher

BRUTE PROTECT

If you are mainly worried about DDoS attacks, Brute Protect has you covered.

http://bruteprotect.com

@michele_butcher

WHO CAN SCAN MY SITE FOR MALWARE?

Google Webmaster Tools http://google.com/webmaster

VirusTotal https://virustotal.com

iThemes Security Pro htttp://ithemes.com/security

@michele_butcher

NEED AN EXTRA EYE ON YOUR SITE?

CloudFlare has a free and premium version.http://cloudflare.com

@michele_butcher

THINGS YOU CAN DO TO PROTECT YOUR WEBSITE

UPDATE!UPDATE!UPDATE!

Update core, update plugins, update themes, update content, update everything and update often!

The biggest source of nearly all hacks as once something is patched, it is trivial to get into the old

stuff.

@michele_butcher

IF YOU USE THEMES OR PLUGINS AT ANY OF THE ENVATO (THEMEFOREST, CODE CANYON)

ALWAYS CHECK THE BOX TO BE NOTIFIED OF UPDATES. THEY WILL NOT TELL YOU OTHERWISE

This is why the RevSlider SoakSoak infection was so widespread. Many didn't know the plugin was built within the theme.

HAVE A MINIMALIST APPROACH TO PLUGINS AND THEMES.

• Only have the plugins you are using at that time on your site. You can always upload them again later.

• Only have your theme you are using on your site.

• If something is not active, delete it.

@michele_butcher

BACK UP YOUR SITE!

SOMEWHERE, ANYWHERE, JUST HAVE A BACKUP COPY.

BackupBuddy from iThemes is a great choice.

iThemes Security will do a database backup for you.

http://ithemes.com/backupbuddy

@michele_butcher

ALWAYS BACK UP TO SOMEPLACE OTHER THAN YOUR SERVER. IF THE SERVER GETS HACKED, SO DOES YOUR

BACKUP.

EVEN BACKING A COPY TO DROPBOX OR YOUR COMPUTER IS A BETTER OPTION.

@michele_butcher

DON’T LET YOUR SITE GET LONELY.

Lonely sites can turn into zombie sites and nobody wants a zombie

@michele_butcher

IF YOUR WEBSITE GET HACKED IT IS NOT THE END OF THE WORLD.

IT CAN AND WILL BE FIXED.

@michele_butcher

WHO CLEANS HACKED WEBSITES?

Well I do over at WP Security Lock ~Smile~

http://wpsecuritylock.com

I apologize… had to do one shameful plug.

@michele_butcher

WHAT ARE OTHER WAYS I CAN BE MORE SECURE?

@michele_butcher

ALWAYS USE COMPLEX PASSWORDS. ALWAYS!

FOR EVERYTHING!

“PASSWORD” IS NEVER AGOOD PASSWORD!

@michele_butcher

NEVER EMAIL PASSWORDS TO ANYONE. INCLUDING

YOURSELF.

@michele_butcher

USE A DIFFERENT PASSWORD FOR EACH AND EVERY THING

YOU LOG INTO.

USE SOMETHING LIKE LASTPASS OR ONE

PASSWORD TO SAVE YOUR PASSWORDS AND TO

SHARE PASSWORDS WITH OTHERS.

IF THE LOGIN HAS A TWO-FACTOR

AUTHENTICATION, USE IT!

@michele_butcher

ANTI-VIRUSPROTECT YOUR UNIT!

Yes I even have an anti-virus on my Mac!

AVG and Avast have free versions as well as paid.Kaspersky is great with Windows and Macs.

@michele_butcher

BE CONSCIOUS WHEN USING PUBLIC WIFI.

@michele_butcher

USE A VPN WHEN CONNECTING OUT IN THE WILD.

torguard.com

@michele_butcher

UPDATE!UPDATE!UPDATE!

Let me say this again

BACK UP EVERYTHING AND BACK IT UP OFTEN.

IF YOU FEAR YOU MIGHT LOSE INFORMATION, SAVE IT IN MORE THAN ONE SPOT. BITCASA, CARBONITE, AND EXTERNAL HARD DRIVES ARE GREAT

OPTIONS OF BACKING UP DATA.

@michele_butcher

QUESTIONS?

@michele_butcher

THANK YOU FOR ATTENDING!

Slides can be found at http://mlb.pw/wcstl2015

Michele Butcher@michele_butcher

http://wpsecuritylock.comhttp://cantspeakgeek.com