Every website owner is responsible for ensuring the safety of their website. Primarily, this is because an unsafe website can spread malware, steal information of website users, and even send spam.
Whether you are an entrepreneur, an enthusiastic blogger, or have a website for whatever reason, it is imperative to take the necessary steps to ensure all your website users are protected.
Apart from keeping hackers and cyber thieves from accessing sensitive information, securing your website can significantly reduce the bounce rate.
If you own a website and are wondering whether it is safe or not, this article is for you. This article will discuss all the essential aspects of keeping your website secure. Read on!
Table of Contents
The importance of HTTPS
HTTPS stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure. Essentially, it is a protocol that guarantees security over the internet, which is provided by an SSL certificate and indicated by a padlock in the browser’s navigation bars.
It is a good sign that you are cautious about safety as it encrypts users’ information, ultimately preventing possible cyber threats while prohibiting data espionage.
Because HTTPS encrypts any information before sending, it gives a reasonable assurance that your site is not fraudulent while transmitting the information securely.
Although any SSL certificate is good to put a padlock on every page of your website, it is advisable that you invest in a premium SSL certificate if your website will be collecting sensitive data from users.
Considering that browsers, including Google Chrome, have begun labeling HTTP websites as “not secure” before opening, having all your URLs equipped with SSL (Secure Socket Layer) can help reduce bounce rate while helping your site rank higher on search engines.
Other than streamlining encryption, SSL and TSL certifications enhance page load speeds, resulting in faster load speeds.
Note: Although HTTPS promises a reasonable level of security, it is not a silver bullet. Indeed, some phishing websites use the protocol so that they can appear to be legitimate. That’s why you should continue reading this checklist.
How to make your website safe and secure
Building websites has become relatively easier, thanks to the availability of easy-to-use content management systems (CMS). The bad news is that many website owners do not know how to make their websites safe.
Whether you are a blogger, affiliate marketer, or are running a small business, it is common knowledge that you want your website users to have a safe browsing experience. That said, here are tips on how to make your website safe and secure.
Use a strong password for your site
The best website security starts with setting a smart and strong password. Well, while everyone knows why they should always use a strong password, it is so surprising that many are super lazy with their passwords.
Let’s face this fact
The backend of every website is password-protected – every website owner needs to set a password for their server and website admin area. While it is easy to be tempted to set an easy-to-remember password, please don’t.
Instead, set a unique password for your website and make sure it is hard to guess. To keep your website safe, set a long password with a fair mix of uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, and special characters, and steer clear of personal information.
Considering that passwords are one of the easiest things you can change to enhance the safety of your website, it is advisable that you change your passwords from time to time while keeping them unique. To avoid falling into a trap, NEVER use the same password twice or share your passwords with others,
Use a reputable hosting company
When building a website, you will be faced with a host of web hosting options. While each web hosting service has unique benefits for your website, one of the most important things you can do for yourself and your website is having your website hosted by a reputable host who takes your website’s security seriously. We recommend Bluehost because it is best form beginners.
A secure, solid web hosting should have various security features to allow you to choose the degree of safety you want. Interestingly, knowledgeable hosting providers can give you helpful tips on how you can make your site.
Your provider should also offer Secure File Transfer Protocol and backup services to protect your uploaded website data better.
Anti-malware software or plugins
There is no shortage of anti-malware and security plugins that you can use to actively prevent hacking attempts and other online threats.
Considering that even the most up-to-date hosting platforms are vulnerable, installing anti-malware plugins will keep hackers from infiltrating your website. Interestingly, most plugins offer high-end protection that no one can take advantage of because they seal all vulnerable loopholes.
Anti-malware software handles the hard work. This gives you peace because you don’t need to worry about the technical stuff. A good hosting provider will likely provide anti-malware software services like malware detection and removal, web scanning, DDOS protection, vulnerability patching, and web application firewall.
As they always say, good website security starts with a reputable web host.
Keep your site up to date
While keeping your website, plugins, apps, and scripts updated seem obvious; it is one of the most essential steps towards ensuring your website is safe. At the bare minimum, you need to run updates for your core software and any installed plugins.
Remember, although plugins do an excellent job in enhancing website user experience, most of them are created by third parties or individuals.
Definitely, this means that you rely on these third parties for security parameters, and your website might be susceptible to bugs and hacking should any of these plugins malfunction.
Setting your time to check these plugins to ensure you are running the most updated versions will eventually pay off as far as the safety and security of your website are concerned.
If you are worried about spending a lot of time checking and updating your websites, the good news is that most plugins allow you to automate updates. All in all, it is worth checking your dashboard and ensuring everything is running smoothly and optimally.
Backup your site
The worst scenario you can experience as a website owner is losing everything because you forgot to backup your website.
Even if you do everything to keep your website safe, uncertainties like server failure can come your way. That’s why you need to invest in automatic backups or schedule regular backups.
Backup systems offer an excellent solution to revive your blog or company’s website when things go wrong – your website can crash, be hacked, or the server can fail abruptly, destroying your hard work. Most importantly, don’t store your website backup on the same server as your website.
One of the cheapest and reliable ways to keep things running is by using a web host service that includes backup in its plans. You can also keep recent backups on your computer or in the cloud. Backing up in the cloud makes it easy to store data and access it from anywhere.
If you opt to backup manually, it is advisable that you do it daily or at most weekly.
Use a web application firewall
There are dozens of ways and tools to prevent breaches and enhance website safety. That said, one of the great methods to keep your data safe is by applying a web application firewall (WAF).
A web application firewall is usually sandwiched between your server and data connection and does an excellent job of reading every bit of data that passes through it to ensure your website is very safe.
Thankfully, most WAFs are plug-and-play, cloud-based services, making them a superior option as they filter spammers and block all hacking attempts and malicious bots.
Limiting login attempts
While you may feel comfortable giving high-level employees access to your website, thinking they will use the site carefully, it is not always the case. Indeed, limiting login attempts or restricting some actions can prevent errors, crashes, and other less than pleasant incidents.
Considering that not all employees are aware or think about website security, limiting logins along with educating every CMS user about the importance of website security will ultimately lower vulnerability.
2-factor authentication
Two-factor authentication promises the ultimate extra layer of security. As the name suggests, two-factor authentication is a second step to verify login to your website.
For someone to log into your account, you will be prompted to verify the login attempt. Normally, two-factor authentication prompts you after inputting the password. Because you must confirm all logins, this additional layer of protection can ward off most malicious activities.
Conclusion
Safeguarding your website and learning how to protect it against hackers is indispensable when it comes to keeping it healthy and safe in the long run. After all, you cannot just build a website and leave it without worrying about its maintenance. While this list is by no means exhaustive, being proactive with these tips can help you enhance the safety of your website.