Is Your Site Secure?
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We all know security is important in everyday life. Your social security number, your bank and credit card numbers…all these are super protected from identity theft. But do you consider the hackers that could steal information from your website? It’s not something most people think about so don’t feel bad if you didn’t. It may seem trivial and that you don’t have anything on your site worth stealing, but you would be surprised. Let’s look at some things you can do to help keep your site secure from hackers.
Keep your site software up to date.
Your website is build using different software: themes, plugins, and platform. These do go out of date and different updates will come out. Make sure you keep that software up to date because it will impact the security of the site if you don’t. Your site could also stop working correctly and break if you don’t’ keep the theme and the plugin software up to date. Make sure that you are deleting any themes or plugins on the site that you are not using. If your site is too cluttered it could leave cracks in your security.
Create a strong password.
When your or your customers create a password for your site, make sure you require a strong password. Don’t use anything that is familiar or is a standard password for you. Use a password generator or create one yourself that uses a mix of letters, numbers, and symbols in a random order. This will make it harder for hackers to access your site and will help keep it more secure.
Add an SSL license to your website.
Google now requires any website that takes any information from users to have an SSL license attached to the site. So basically an SSL license is a certification that your site is locked down and safe. You can get an SSL from sites like GoDaddy and have your server host install it for you. To see if your site has an SSL look up in the web address bar at the top of the screen. If you see a green lock and that the URL starts with https:// then the site has an SSL license and is secure. Another thing to do is to install security plugins that help stop an attack as well as notify you of when an attack happens.
Use a secure and reputable server host.
When you build or move your website you need to make sure your server is one that is currently on the newest security threats. They need to create backups of your site and keep them on a remote server. This will help keep your site secure without risk of getting viruses or getting hacked.
You should keep your site as secure as possible, but this may all be more than you have time to handle. You might want to hire a security specialist company to run tests and monitor your website for attacks. They have the people and the programs to scan your site for where you are most vulnerable. Take the initiative and make sure your site is as secure as possible.