Here are three easy but important ways to protect yourself if you run a WordPress blog:
- Secure your /wp-admin/ directory. What I’ve done is lock down /wp-admin/ so that only certain IP addresses can access that directory. I use an .htaccess file, which you can place directly at /wp-admin/.htaccess . This is what mine looks like:
AuthUserFile /dev/null
AuthGroupFile /dev/null
AuthName “Access Control”
AuthType Basic
order deny,allow
deny from all
# whitelist home IP address
allow from 64.233.169.99
# whitelist work IP address
allow from 69.147.114.210
allow from 199.239.136.200
# IP while in Kentucky; delete when back
allow from 128.163.2.27
I’ve changed the IP addresses, but otherwise that’s what I use. This file says that the IP address 64.233.169.99 (and the other IP addresses that I’ve whitelisted) are allowed to access /wp-admin/, but all other IP addresses are denied access. Has this saved me from being hacked before? Yes. - Make an empty wp-content/plugins/index.html file. Otherwise you leak information on which plug-ins you run. If someone wanted to hack your blog, they might be able to do it by discovering that you run an out-of-date plugin on your blog and then they could exploit that.
- Subscribe to the WordPress Development blog at http://wordpress.org/development/feed/ . When WordPress patches a security hole or releases a new version, they announce it on that blog. If you see a security patch released, you need to upgrade or apply the patch. You leave yourself open to being hacked if you don’t upgrade.
And here’s a bonus tip: in the header.php file for your theme, you might want to check for a line like
