How to prevent attacks on your website? These actions are the day-to-day of online companies, so it is very important to avoid being a victim of pirates and online scammers and to be able to enjoy the security and protection of your website.
Why is it important to prevent attacks on your website?
Online security and the protection of a website are essential to guarantee the confidentiality, integrity and availability of data, as well as to maintain the trust of users and comply with applicable regulations. Here we will show you why you need to protect your website from online attacks. Let’s see:
Protection of user data
A website may contain sensitive user information, such as names, addresses, phone numbers, or even financial data. It is essential to ensure that this data is protected from unauthorized access and possible cyber attacks.
Maintain user trust
Online security plays a critical role in building and maintaining user trust.
If a website is not secure and security breaches occur, users will lose trust in the site and the company or person behind it. Loss of trust can have a negative impact on the reputation and success of the site.
Prevention of attacks and hacking
Websites are constantly targeted by cyber attacks, such as hacking, data theft, phishing, and other types of malware.
These attacks can have serious consequences, from site downtime to loss of valuable data.
Implementing appropriate security measures can help prevent these attacks and protect the site against potential vulnerabilities.
Compliance with rules and regulations
Depending on the geographic location and the type of website, certain rules and regulations regarding the privacy and security of user data may need to be followed.
For example, in many countries, there is an obligation to protect personal data under data protection laws. Failure to comply with these regulations can have serious legal and financial consequences.
Avoid data loss and downtime
A successful attack on a website can result in the loss of important data or site downtime. This can negatively affect the operation of the company and the satisfaction of the users.
Implementing proper security measures, such as regular backups and intrusion detection systems, can help minimize the risk of data loss and downtime.
Common types of attacks on a website
There are different ways to carry out an attack on a website that affects different aspects, among them are:
code injection
Malicious code is inserted into a web application to gain unauthorized access to the underlying database or system. The most common injection attacks include SQL injection and Command injection.
Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)
In an XSS attack, an attacker inserts malicious code into a website, which is executed in the browser of users who visit the site. This allows the attacker to steal sensitive information, such as login credentials or session cookies.
Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
The attacker tricks a user into performing an unwanted action on a website to which the user is authenticated. This is accomplished by manipulating legitimate HTTP requests, which can result in unauthorized actions such as changing passwords, making purchases, or deleting data.
brute force attacks
The attacker attempts to discover passwords by repeatedly guessing them or trying different combinations until they find the correct one. Brute force attacks can target user authentication or website administration panels.
Denial of service (DoS) and flood attacks (DDoS)
An attempt is made to overwhelm a website or server with a number of requests, making the site or server inaccessible to legitimate users. In this type of attack, multiple compromised systems are used to launch the attack, making it more difficult to mitigate.
pharming
In a pharming attack, traffic from a legitimate website is redirected to a fake version, with the goal of stealing sensitive user information, such as login credentials or financial data.
Privilege escalation attacks
These aim to gain higher privileges on a system or web application to access information or perform unauthorized actions. For example, an attacker could attempt to gain root or administrator access through vulnerabilities in configuration or permission management.
7 fundamental tips on how to prevent attacks on your website
Choose a secure web hosting service
Choosing a secure web hosting provider is essential for the security of a website. A good hosting service should offer strong security measures such as:
- Firewall
- network monitoring
- DDoS Protection
- Regular server software updates.
You should also have adequate security and data protection policies in place.
Keep software up to date
Correction of security vulnerabilities
Software, including CMS (content management system) and plugins, may contain vulnerabilities that could be exploited by attackers.
Software updates often include patches and fixes to close these known vulnerabilities, making your website more secure.
Patches against known exploits
Exploits are malicious code or techniques used to exploit specific vulnerabilities in software. When exploits are discovered and made public, attackers will try to use them to hack into outdated websites.
By updating the CMS and plugins, you ensure that your website is protected against known exploits, as updates usually include security measures that counteract these threats.
Improved security and stability
Software updates often include improvements to system security and stability. Developers continually work to identify and fix security issues, resulting in more secure versions of the software.
In addition, updates can also fix bugs and compatibility issues that could affect the stability of your website. By keeping your software up to date, you ensure a more secure and stable environment for your website and visitors.
Compliance with standards and regulations
In many cases, keeping software up to date is a requirement to comply with security standards and legal regulations, such as compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Failure to comply with these regulations can result in fines and penalties.
Support and feature updates
Updates to the CMS, plugins and themes may also include improvements to the features and functionality of the software. These updates may give you new tools and options to optimize your website and improve the user experience.
Additionally, keeping your software up-to-date allows you to take advantage of support and technical assistance offered by developers and the community, which helps you resolve issues and keep your website running smoothly.
Use of strong passwords
Weak or easily guessed passwords such as “123456” or “password” are easy targets for attackers. Using strong passwords makes password-guessing attempts much more difficult, as they are more complex and less predictable.
Resistance to brute force attacks
As we mentioned before, these consist of trying different password combinations until you find the correct one. Strong passwords with a combination of letters (uppercase and lowercase), numbers, and special characters make these attacks much more difficult and time-consuming, deterring attackers.
Protection against the use of compromised passwords
Attackers often obtain passwords through data leaks or hacks into other services or websites.
If users reuse the same passwords on different platforms, an attacker could use those compromised passwords to access other sites, including your website. By using strong and unique passwords, you avoid this risk.
Prevention of phishing attacks
As phishing attacks are attempts to trick users into revealing their passwords or other sensitive information. By using strong passwords, users are more aware of the importance of protecting their information and are less likely to fall for these attacks.
Using two-factor authentication (2FA)
Two-factor authentication adds an extra layer of security by requiring not only a password but also another authentication factor, such as a code generated in an app or sent via text message. This makes it even more difficult for unauthorized access even if a strong password is compromised.
Implementation of firewalls and traffic filtering
Control of incoming traffic
A firewall acts as a security barrier between the internal network and external traffic. It allows you to filter and control incoming traffic to your website, helping to block and prevent unauthorized access, malicious attacks, and unwanted requests.
Traffic filtering allows you to identify and block suspicious IP addresses, malicious packets or abnormal traffic patterns, thus protecting the website from possible attacks.
Prevention of known attacks
Firewalls may be configured to detect and block traffic patterns associated with known attacks, such as brute force attacks, SQL injections, or denial of service (DDoS) attacks.
When this type of traffic is blocked, the website’s exposure to vulnerabilities is reduced and the chance of successful attacks is minimized.
Protection against emerging threats
Firewalls and traffic filtering can be constantly updated with lists of known threats and attack patterns. This helps protect the website against new and emerging security threats.
By keeping your firewalls and filters up to date, you can proactively block malicious traffic before it reaches your website.
DDoS Attack Mitigation
Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks can flood a website with a large amount of traffic, resulting in server downtime and site unavailability.
By implementing a firewall with DDoS mitigation and traffic filtering capabilities, malicious traffic patterns associated with these attacks can be identified and blocked.
Install or buy the best security plugins (extensions)
Security plugins are tools specifically designed to protect a website against possible attacks. These can provide features such as:
- malware detection
- Suspicious Activity Monitoring
- Malicious IP address blocking
- Web Application Firewall (WAF) and much more.
Install an SSL certificate and protect your website in HTTPS
An SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) certificate encrypts the communication between the server and the users who visit the website, establishing a secure connection.
By installing an SSL certificate and ensuring that the website loads over HTTPS, transmitted data such as login information, personal data, and transactions are protected.
This prevents attackers from intercepting and accessing sensitive information, ensuring the privacy and integrity of website and visitor data.
Create daily backups of all your data
Carrying out regular backups is essential to protect information and data on the website.
In the event that the website is compromised or experiences a failure, backups allow you to quickly restore the site to a previous state and recover lost data.
It ensures that the most recent version of data is available and minimizes the risk of losing valuable information. Therefore, it is recommended to store backups in secure locations, preferably off the website’s main server.
