How to Improve Website Security: 4 Tips
Posted on
July 22, 2019 at
1:22 PM
They’re in the news and if you’re unlucky, they may even make their way into your website. Indeed, today’s hackers have found new and innovative ways to steal sensitive information from eCommerce customers and wreak general havoc for many innocent websites in the process. While these hackers aren’t going away any time soon, there are some precautions you can take to better your website against their attacks.
Today’s hackers – some of which are
actually high-powered computer programs – are trained to take advantage of systematic and human mistakes whenever possible.
As such, it is always important to cover
obvious vulnerabilities in your website’s file system and passwords.
Similarly, it always worthwhile to install
and maintain the most capable modern security protocols, be they through
plug-ins or provided by your web host.
Improving your website security can be
challenging on your own, so consider following these 4 tips in order to bolster
your defenses against nefarious digital forces. With these tips in mind, you’ll
be better able to upgrade your existing security stance and create a reliable
web security system to serve your website for years to come:
First and foremost, proper website security
begins from the moment you decide to start a website. Just as shopping for real
estate in a prosperous part of town can make a difference for a
brick-and-mortar business, your choice of a trustworthy
hosting provider can pay dividends when it comes to protecting you
from the internet’s most noteworthy threats.
When looking for a reliable web host, be
sure to look for certified security
protocols among their core features (such as integrated SSL certificates
and DDoS protections). Also, be sure to read
service reviews from current and former users of that particular service
provider. These reviews can often provide some of the post candid insight into
a given web host’s security capabilities.
Tip #2 – Install Quality
Security Protocols
Along the same lines, you must put in the
extra effort to ensure that all of your
auxiliary security protocols are up to snuff. At a bare minimum, this means
implementing security plug-ins and certificates (such as SSL) that encrypt
sensitive user information (such as credit card numbers). This can prevent
critical user data from leaking out through interference in your website’s
primary information transmissions.
Source:
https://framework.dreamscape.cloud/design_framework/vodien/images/free_paid_ssl/ssl.svg
In particular, proper SSL certification can
go a long way towards assuring customers that your eCommerce platform is
secured. Browser users will be signaled to the presence of an SSL certificate
when their browsing bar lights up green and provides the “HTTPS” prefix to your
website. This minor signal can go a long way towards building audience trust
towards your security posture.
Both CMS and HTML websites alike should consider implementing a broad spectrum
security regiment, such as those offered by SiteLock. SiteLock, in
particular, specializes in closing newly identified security loopholes and
detecting potentially malicious malware – both of which can put your website in
severe jeopardy if left unattended.
Tip #3 – Create New Secure
Passwords
While every computer security system is
bound to show its vulnerabilities in time, human users are constantly prone to
making mistakes that leave your website open to intrusion. This can most
visibly be seen in terms of password creation, where humans are more likely to
create a personally memorable password rather than a security code that is
challenging (if not practically impossible) for a brute force computer program
to crack.
Source: https://xkcd.com/936/
When it comes to creating fresh passwords,
your best bet is to use a specialized
password generator that either outputs random strings of letters and number
or uses strings of random (though memorable) words to add to a password’s
overall entropy. In either case, these generators take advantage of modern
research to create secure passwords that aren’t simple decoding.
These complicated passwords can be a hassle
to remember, there’s no ignoring that. For this reason, website’s with multiple
passwords (for administrative or root access) should make use of a certified password manager as soon as possible. This
will provide a second layer of protection for these critical digital keys as
well as provide you a method for keeping these new passwords well organized.
Tip #4 – Lock Down your File
Permissions
Along the same lines as improving your
password protocols, you should also take
time to reevaluate and enhance your file permissions systems. Though few
average website administrators ever think about them, weaknesses in individual
file permissions are among the most prone to use as a backdoor into a website’s
larger file system. This can lead to leaking of sensitive user information in
many cases.
Depending on the nature of your website, as
well as how it is hosted, you’ll need to approach your file permissions using
several different techniques. If you possess root level access (such as through
a Linux-based system), you can manually modify specific file permission through
numeric values (“0” for no permissions, “1” for executing, “2” for write, and
“4” for reading).
Source: http://linuxcommand.org/images/file_permissions.png
Websites that use a GUI or other
user-friendly file management system often offer advanced settings to toggle
these permissions with digging around in the website’s code. Though it may take
a while, you should take all the time necessary to individually run through
your website’s entire file system to ensure that no outside sources can access
or modify important core file without centrally-administered permission.
Website
Security Should be a Priority
All in all, there’s a lot more than you could
be doing in order to improve your website’s security posture. In many cases,
you’ll need to focus on patching the vulnerabilities in your website’s primary
operation, both those caused by the system itself and those implemented by its
human users.
Perhaps the most
important tip for improving your website’s security is… “don’t wait!” Modern
internet hackers are ruthless and won’t wait until you’ve improved your
security to levy an attack that wrecks your website and exposes your customers’
sensitive information. Make a plan to improve your website’s security portfolio
today in order to protect everything you’ve built on your digital domain.
Gloss