AIOSEO Release Testing

Category: Security

WordPress Will Require Users to Have HTTPS This Year

Home » Security

WordPress founder, Matt Mullenweg, recently announced that the software will require all hosts to have HTTPS for certain WordPress features to function.

Don’t panic just yet. If you already have HTTPS, this shouldn’t affect you. But if you’re still using HTTP, you’ll need to upgrade soon. The good news is that the transition is not as difficult as you think it is and the benefits outweigh the assumed disadvantages.

This article will go over what the WordPress HTTPS mandate means for you as a site owner; the advantages; as well as how to upgrade to HTTPS if you haven’t already done so.

What is HTTPS?

HTTPS adds a security layer to HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol). HTTPS essentially encrypts data (using SSL or TSL) that is communicated between servers and clients until it reaches the intended recipient.

This prevents cybercriminals from accessing sensitive user information and also reduces the risk of tapping and modification of sensitive data. Although HTTPS is not completely foolproof, it undoubtedly has major security advantages.

HTTPS sites can be easily identified, as they have a locked padlock icon located on the link bar in most common browsers.

Why is WordPress Pushing HTTPS?

There’s mainly two reasons for this, so let’s quickly dive into them.

Google Prefers It

It is no secret that greater encryption and cyber security has made the Internet a safer place for users. As usual, a Google update signaled the necessity of HTTPS for user experience, SEO and internet security.

In 2014, Google suggested that enabling HTTPS on your site could result in higher search rankings. Although it still isn’t the only important factor in raising your site rankings, you shouldn’t underestimate its value. For example, if two sites are equal in all ways, but one site has HTTPS, that site would get a boost in rankings.

Chrome will display a green padlock in the link bar when a site is using HTTPS, assuring users it’s using the latest security protocol.

In January of this year, Google released version 56 of Google Chrome. This new release brought about some changes, notably with how Google Chrome treats HTTPS vs. HTTP sites. The browser now clearly identifies sites that are not operating HTTPS on their systems. For example, a “Not Secure” message now appears on pages without HTTPS that try to collect passwords or sensitive information. You can expect that, eventually, all pages not using HTTPS will clearly be labeled as having insecure connections.

We can reasonably assume that Google’s preference for HTTPS has been a contributing factor for the changes implemented by WordPress.

Users Prefer HTTPS Too

A secure connection can make all the difference from a user’s perspective. Users see HTTPS as a positive signal that you are taking your site security seriously, for their benefit. So, having HTTPS could mean more traffic and longer usage times on your site.

HTTPS is particularly important if you are operating an e-commerce site. Simply seeing the padlock icon could make users more comfortable in entering their payment details and other personal information. Particularly with the new Chrome update (mentioned earlier) which shows a “Not Secure” label on e-commerce sites or sites that require a user login or credit card information, but don’t have HTTPS.

Both Google and user preference should be enough reason for you to upgrade your site to HTTPS. It is simply necessary to ensure watertight security for your users and to protect your online business reputation.

Sites that require users to login or enter credit card information are now displayed as “Not secure” in Chrome when they haven’t switched to HTTPS yet.

Remember when JavaScript was first introduced and quickly embraced by users and webmasters? Looking back, we can see now that JavaScript was essential for smoother and better user experience. HTTPS similarly, presents a number of unique advantages for user experience and security that we should all quickly embrace.

We know that you may be overwhelmed switching from HTTP to HTTPS. After all, change does takes time to get used to, but in this instance, you may need to quickly get on board. At this point, the advantages of HTTPS have greatly outnumbered the disadvantages. Plus, upgrading to HTTPS is no longer the costly, time consuming, and difficult process that it once was. In fact, getting an SSL certificate in 2017 is fast, sometimes free, and quite easy to implement.

How to Get HTTPS

WordPress hosting partners should now provide an SSL certificate for all accounts. (It is required that they all do so as early as the first quarter of this year.)

Your hosting provider may already provide a free SSL certificate, so check with them first before you make any third-party purchase. If they do not offer a free one, you could ask them if they sell third party SSL certificates. Once purchased, you can ask your provider to install the certificate for you on your server.

Dozens of major companies are already backing Lets Encrypt, including Automattic (known for WooCommerce, Akismet and WordPress.com)

Another option is to explore the free alternatives, independent of your hosting provider. There are projects such as “Let’s Encrypt” which have now made it easy and quick to secure a free HTTPS certificate for your website.

Let’s Encrypt is an authorized open Certificate Authority with millions of active certificates in place. There are other comparable projects out there that can help by guiding you step-by-step through the installation process or who have been authorized to deliver certificates.

Remember that SSL certificates upgrade the website, but not the content itself. That means that the content on your page will also need to be updated so as to avoid 404 errors. Google may interpret the error as a mismatch in the security level of your site. The only way to avoid this is by encrypting the content of your website to match your SSL certificate.

To track and resolve any 404 errors on your site, you may want to use a specialised plugin such as Redirection to do so.

What if You Just Don’t Want to Upgrade to HTTPS?

You could see a number of things happening to your site over time if you do not upgrade to HTTPS. The first may be facing the consequences set out by Google, i.e: lower rankings and having your users staring at a “Not Secure” warning when they try to access your site via Google Chrome.

The second is that you could struggle with WordPress updates and lose some or all functionality on specific WordPress plugins.

Third, your site may be an easier target for hacking.

Those are three consequences that require you to seriously reconsider if you really want to take the risk of not upgrading to HTTPS.

Wrapping Up

Let’s put it this way: you will simply have nothing to lose by adopting HTTPS. Yet, if you do not use HTTPS, you could risk leaving your site in the “dark ages” of the Internet.

But then again, if you’re a WordPress site owner, you have no choice. Take the plunge and let us know how it worked out for you!

06/06/2017
WordPress Hack Redirects Visitors to Malicious Sites
Security is a major concern for WordPress site owners and rightly so: there are over 7.5 million cyber-attacks on WordPress sites every hour. Unsurprisingly, WordPress’ open-source nature and flexibility makes it vulnerable to a host of diverse attacks. But its core is quite secure as the WordPress team is dedicated to conserving the structural integrity of the application. The same, however, cannot be said for all WordPress themes and plugins.

A malware attack was recently discovered by John Castro of Sucuri. The malware places 10-12 lines of code at the top of vulnerable WordPress theme header.php files in order to redirect visitors to malicious sites.

This article will provide details of the attack; as well as tips to secure your site from such attacks in the future.

How the Malware Attack Works

As mentioned earlier, the malware places 10-12 lines of code at the top of the header.php file of an active WordPress theme. The code appears as follows:

The malware redirects visitors to default7 .com (not the final redirect destination) upon their first visit. It then sets the “896diC9OFnqeAcKGN7fW”cookie to track returning visitors for a year, and tests for search engine crawlers. If there are no crawlers, it proceeds to check the user agent header.

The redirects are random for everyone. Furthermore, default7 .com is only just the first redirect destination. Visitors are further redirected to the following domains (depending on the IP address and browser):
- test246 .com
- test0 .com
- distinctfestive .com
- ableoccassion .com
What is particularly interesting is the malware’s behavior on Internet Explorer. When the visitor uses Internet Explorer, they are redirected to a site that provides a malicious Flash or Java update.

Another interesting behavior occurs on Facebook. When you share an infected site link on Facebook, you may see the post snippet from another site – one of the five redirect sites. Facebook will still redirect people to the malicious site, even after you remove the malware from your site. This is because the cache is shared. You can reset the cache here.

You may be surprised to hear that this kind of infection is quite common when hackers get access to a WordPress admin interface. With the right credentials, they are able to (quite easily) edit a theme file.

Which Sites Are Infected?

The recent exploit is actually not the only malware threat on infected sites. In a majority of cases, the infected sites had several security vulnerabilities resulting in a number of other infections. Just a minority of sites showed that the infection was only found in the theme’s header.php file.

How to Detect the Malware

The malware code is not without flaws. That is, it often tests for parameters that do not exist, which results in a PHP error. Since some servers have PHP notices turned off, the error is not always displayed; but a Google search of “Notice: Undefined index: 6FoNxbvo73BHOjhxokW3” may reveal the malware code on your server.

Sucuri shared that some Google search results could reveal errors in the theme footer file. That is because the malware previously infected footer.php files and placed a similar redirect code at the top of those files. The attack moved to header.php files and re-infected sites that had the malware code in their footer.php file. Even though the malware has been updated, the redirects send visitors to the exact same pages.

How to Remove Malware

Removing malware is a multi-step process that you may want to consult a WordPress expert on. If you’re not that experienced in security yourself, odds are you’ll only make things worse. Businesses specialized in WordPress such as our very own Semper Fi Web Design team can address all your security concerns.

But for now, let’s take a look at what you can do in general to protect your site from such attacks.

How to Keep Your WordPress Site Secure

Protect Your WordPress Admin Interface

Your WordPress admin panel is a goldmine for criminals. Therefore, you need to restrict access to it as much as possible: only those who need to access it should be able to. In any case, you should restrict everybody’s ability to make changes to your header.php file.

As we’ve seen with this recent redirect attack, hackers with admin credentials to your site can directly and easily make changes to your theme’s header.php file. You can effortlessly disable a user’s ability to edit PHP files in your admin interface by adjusting your wp-config.php file. Simply copy and paste the following code in your wp-config.php file:
```
# Disable Theme Editing
 define( 'DISALLOW_FILE_EDIT', true );
```
Other tips for keeping your admin interface secure:
- Use strong passwords
- Change all passwords periodically
- Limit the number of login attempts
- Check to make sure that no fake admin accounts have been created
- Do not use “admin” as your admin username
- Enable two-factor authentication
Update WordPress, Themes and Plugins to Latest Versions

It is critical to update WordPress and all of your themes and plugins to their latest versions. In addition to improved functionality, most updates are provided to address security concerns and vulnerabilities, so update to the latest versions as soon as they are available.

Make Sure Your Computer(s) Is Free of Viruses and Malware

Any precautionary measures you take to protect your site from malware would all be null and void if your computer contains any viruses or malware. That’s because a hacker could access your site’s login details from your computer and swiftly proceed to infect the site. Therefore, it’s important to install a good antivirus program on all computers you use to log into your WordPress site.

Most of us love WordPress for its flexibility, among many other reasons. Indeed, it is the most popular open-source Content Management System (CMS) out there. However, the reasons we love it so much are the very reasons that make it vulnerable to cyber-attacks. It’s important to be aware of that and take the necessary steps to protect your site.
12/09/2016
HTTPS: Is It Enough to Keep Your WordPress Site Secure?

Your website is a goldmine for cyber criminals. They are fast, invisible and always on the prowl for sensitive customer account details or to simply destroy. If you’re a WordPress site owner, you are no doubt aware of the vulnerabilities WordPress sites have experienced in recent years. The good news is that Automattic recently took a much anticipated security step by adding HTTPS encryption to all custom WordPress.com domains (more than 1 million WordPress sites).

You are probably familiar with web encryption as one of the most effective ways to keep data secure. Indeed, encryption is a hot topic right now. Apple recently made headlines after refusing to comply with a court order to assist the FBI to unlock the iPhone used by the San Bernardino shooter. Apple stated that it would need to write new software that would essentially be a master key to opening any iPhone. The main argument was that if the FBI could unlock that iPhone, they could unlock many others, putting everyone’s privacy and personal safety at risk.

For those reasons, among many others, web security should always be at the top of your mind in running your business. But what exactly is HTTPS and how is it beneficial to your business? Can HTTPS alone sufficiently protect your WordPress site? This article will answer those questions in the quest to help you bolster your site security.

What Exactly Is HTTPS?

HTTPS stands for Hyper Text Transport Protocol Secure – the secure connection protocol for HTTP. When you connect to HTTPS, you are using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) or Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocols to protect communications between your computer and a remote server. Both protocols use encryption to keep cyber criminals from intercepting communications.

The information you send across the web passes from computer to computer before it arrives at the end server. That means that all computers the information passes through could read the sensitive information: from usernames and passwords to credit card information and social security numbers. SSL or TSL encrypts the sensitive information through its journey to the intended recipient, so that only they can understand it.

How Is HTTPS Beneficial to Your Website?

HTTPS encryption is very important for both site security and SEO.

HTTPS keeps your business communications with your online customers safe and secure. When it is enabled, any information between the server and a client cannot be diverted, modified, or stolen. This kind of security is essential for any site that has a login and/or payment system – basically any ecommerce business. It not only protects your data but allows web visitors to view your site as credible. In that sense, HTTPS is essential for all businesses and new websites.

Google has also highlighted the importance of HTTPS encryption. In 2014, Google announced that it would start using HTTPS as a ranking signal. That’s right: Google is ranking sites with HTTPS encryption higher than those without it. That announcement pushed a lot of websites across the globe to obtain HTTPS.

Is HTTPS Encryption Enough to Keep Your Site Secure?

No. Although it helps protect your sensitive data, securing your websites is much more complex than HTTPS. The bottom line is that it does not protect your site, network or server from getting hacked. It also does not prevent hackers from abusing software vulnerabilities that may be present in WordPress. In fact, in general, we’ve seen quite a few major attacks on SSL and TSL protocols: Poodle, Heartbleed, Shellshock, LogJam to mention a few.

So what are your options? What can do you to fortify your site?

What More Can You Do to Protect Your Site?

Security is highly important and as such, there are quite a few things you need to do and stay on top of. We’ll go into this in more detail in another post. For now, here are a few things you need to do to fortify your WordPress site.

Know What the Threat Is

Stay on top of hacking threats. You need to know what is happening, what is possible, in order to protect your site against potential threats. Set up news alerts or follow hacking news sites. The information you receive will give you the ability to take precautionary measures.

Update, Update, Update

Update software as soon as an update is available. The reason behind a lot of updates is to protect against a security vulnerability, so delaying an update greatly exposes you to a potential attack. Hackers are constantly on the lookout for vulnerabilities. If you don’t move quickly to patch vulnerabilities, chances are you’ll become easy prey.

Secure Your Admin Dashboard

Access to information in the admin dashboard of your website is every hacker’s dream. Set usernames and passwords that cannot be easily guessed; greatly limit the number of login attempts within a specific time period; don’t send account details over email etc. Your admin panel is a treasure-trove so keep it secured at all times.

Keep Your Network Secure

An insecure network provides fairly easy access to your site servers. Take some precautionary measures such as frequently changing passwords, expiring logins after a certain period of inactivity, setting strong passwords, and scanning malware on each and every device that connects to your network.

Back-Up Everything

Back-up everything, both on-site and off-site. Set up automatic backups several times a day, to various locations, so you don’t lose everything when the worst-case scenario happens.

HTTPS encryption is great for security, SEO and credibility. You most likely were quite overjoyed when Automattic made the announcement that all custom domains would automatically switch to HTTPS encryption. But that does not mean you’re in the clear when it comes to site security.

There is a whole lot more that needs to be done to keep any website safe from advanced, constantly evolving and persistent cyber threats. Some of the tips mentioned in this article will help to reinforce your site security; and keep your mind at ease to tackle the more fun business operations.

24/05/2016
Beware of spam emails regarding WordPress Customer Reward Program

We are aware of a spam email that is going around regarding All in One SEO Pack. The email starts with “You have been chosen by WordPress to take part in our Customer Reward(ing) Program” and states that you have won a free copy of All in One SEO Pack Pro. The emails typically come from a WordPress.org email address and include a ZIP file that has been reported to include malware.

This is a typical Phishing attack aimed at getting the recipient to open the attachment or in this case install the attached ZIP file on a WordPress site. Do not open emails from people you don’t know. Do not download, open or install any attachment unless you know for sure who it came from and what it contains.

In this case these emails did not originate from WordPress.org, they are spam sent by unknown senders. The file attached to the email is not a copy of All in One SEO Pack Pro and neither WordPress.org nor Semper Fi Web Design would send unsolicited emails with attachments. Most spam filters should pick up these emails and mark them as spam. If your spam filter does not, then mark the email as spam and delete it.

There are also numerous websites claiming to have a free copy of All in One SEO Pack Pro to download. The ONLY valid source to purchase and download All in One SEO Pack Pro is from our SemperPlugins.com store.

02/12/2013