How To Secure A Website: Best Tips to Keep Your website Safe.

When people ask me how to make sure their website is 100% secure, I joke and say, “Just keep it offline.”

After the laughter dies down, we usually talk about website builders and content management systems (CMS) to figure out which one offers the best security.

But here’s the thing: whether you use a website builder for a blog or a CMS for your business site, there’s always a risk involved.

And guess what? You’re the one responsible for managing that risk. And trying to handle it all on your own can lead to disaster pretty quickly.

That’s why I’m sharing some straightforward tips in this article to help keep your website secure.

You don’t need a Ph.D. to implement these strategies; they’re simple and effective.

And no matter which option you choose, these tips have proven themselves in real-world battles against hackers and bots.

Let’s explore in detail below: –

How to secure a website: Top risk-minimization strategies

Securing a website isn’t a sure thing. There’s no magic solution to keep hackers away forever.

So, your best bet is to use these strategies to lower the chances of getting hacked and make it easier to bounce back if it does happen.

1. Make sure you use HTTPS everywhere by installing an SSL certificate

If you’re building your first website, you might think data encryption is something only big businesses or investigators need.

But if you want your site to show up well on Google and collect emails, you’ll need an SSL certificate.

An SSL certificate is like a secret code that keeps sensitive info safe when it’s sent to your website. Without it, hackers could read things like passwords and bank details.

Thankfully, getting an SSL certificate is easy. Most web hosts have tools to help you install one with just a few clicks. For example, Bluehost offers

Let’s Encrypt certificates right in their control panel. If your host doesn’t have an easy tool, you can use Let’s Encrypt guides to set it up yourself.

Once it’s installed, your website will be more secure, and visitors won’t see scary warnings about their data being at risk.

2. Secure your login page and process

When it comes to keeping your login secure, there are two main things you can do: use strong passwords and set up multi-factor authentication.

Strong passwords are really important because they’re hard for hackers to guess or crack. To make it easier to manage your passwords, you can use a tool called a password manager.

It helps you create strong passwords and keeps them safe for you.
Another layer of security is multi-factor authentication.

This means you need more than just a password to log in. Usually, you’ll get a code sent to your phone or email that you have to enter along with your password.

For your website users, you can enforce strong password policies using tools like Password Policy Manager for WordPress. And for multi-factor authentication, you can use apps like Google Authenticator or Authy.

These apps make it so that whenever someone tries to log in to your website, they’ll need to enter a code from their phone or another device.

Setting up these security measures can help protect your website and keep sensitive information safe.

3. Make regular backups of your site

Securing a website can start with something as simple as making regular backups.

Backups are like safety nets for your website. They won’t scare off hackers, but they’re there to help you recover if something goes wrong. Different website builders have different ways of handling backups:

• Wix automatically backs up your site every week.
• Shopify has apps like Rewind that you can use for backups.
• Squarespace has some backup options, like duplicating your site or exporting an XML file.
• If you’re using WordPress, there are lots of plugins you can use to create backups.

For WordPress, I recommend UpdraftPlus. It’s what I use, and it’s free. With UpdraftPlus, you can back up your site directly to the cloud, like Google Drive or Dropbox, without any limits. And if something bad happens to your site, UpdraftPlus can help you restore it quickly.

4. Keep all software up-to-date

I really like using WordPress for my sites because they make building websites super easy.

With themes and plugins, you can do pretty much anything without needing to know how to code. The same goes for platforms like Wix and Shopify—they have apps that do a lot of the work for you. Sounds awesome, right?

Well, sort of.

The problem is, all these extra tools can make it tricky to keep your website safe. If even one plugin or app is poorly made, it can open up your site to hackers. And if you’re not keeping everything updated regularly, you’re leaving your site vulnerable.

But don’t worry, there are things you can do to make your site more secure:

• Get rid of any plugins or apps you’re not using.
• Always keep your plugins, themes, and software up to date.
• Only use plugins, themes, and apps from developers who are good at keeping their products secure.

Do some research before connecting your site to any other networks or services.

If you’re using WordPress, you’ll get notifications right in your dashboard when there are updates available for your software, themes, and plugins.

You can even set things up to update automatically, which is super handy.

For the safest option, you might want to look into a managed hosting plan.

With this, not only will your site have extra security measures in place, but someone else will handle all the updates for you, too.

5. Use a web application firewall (WAF) for proactive protection

If you want to make your website super strong, like Arnold Schwarzenegger, you should get a web application firewall (WAF).
A web application firewall is like a guard for your website.

Just like the firewall on your computer, it has rules to stop bad guys from attacking. It’s really good at stopping common attacks like cross-site scripting and SQL injections.

The cool thing is, WAFs can quickly update their rules to protect against new threats.

There are three main types of WAFs:

• Network-based: These are the strongest and are provided by top-notch hosts like Kinsta and website builders like Squarespace.
• Host-based: These are built into the application itself, usually as a plugin or app.
• Cloud-based: These are super popular and easy to set up.

For WordPress users, Wordfence is a great option for a WAF. It helps keep your site safe from all kinds of attacks.

6. Be an effective site administrator

As the person in charge of a website, there are lots of little things to keep an eye on, but paying attention to them can make a big difference in how secure your site is.

Here’s a quick rundown:

User roles: Make sure you know what roles each user has. This helps you control who can access what on your site. Only give users the roles they need—giving them more access than necessary can make your site less secure.

Keep an eye on user activity: Use tools like WP Activity Log to see what users are doing on your site. This helps you spot any suspicious behavior.

Clean up inactive users: Get rid of users who haven’t been active for a while. They could be a security risk if their accounts are compromised.

Moderate comments manually: Don’t automatically approve comments. Instead, go through them yourself and reject any that look suspicious, like ones with links or code.

Restrict file uploads: Only allow certain types of files to be uploaded to your site. This helps prevent attackers from uploading malicious files.

Scan and verify uploads: Use a tool like Sucuri to scan any files that are uploaded to your site. This helps catch any malicious files before they can cause harm.
By staying on top of these tasks, you can help keep your website safe and secure for both you and your users.

7. Stay alert

If you’ve already put in place the solutions mentioned above, you’ve made it much harder for hackers to attack your site.

But to keep it that way, you need to do regular checks of your website and any external content you add, like ads.

For instance, to protect against malicious ads, make sure to only work with trusted ad networks. Also, scan and test all ads before they appear on your site to make sure they’re safe.

A tool like Sucuri SiteCheck is great for checking your site for viruses, malware, and other bad stuff. And the best part is, it’s free!

For really important sites, you should also do regular security audits. Here’s how:

Use tools like Pentest Tools to scan your site and find any weak spots hackers could exploit. This can help you see if there are any problems with your network, if sensitive pages are visible to Google, or if your SSL connection is strong.

Perform vulnerability assessments using a checklist to make sure you’re not missing anything important. This includes things like checking for old plugins or themes, making sure everything is up to date, and removing inactive users.

These steps might seem like a lot, especially for a simple blog, but they’re important for keeping your site safe, especially if it’s a big deal for you.

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Conclusion

Keeping a website secure and protecting the data of your users and visitors doesn’t have to be overwhelming.

With my seven-step approach, you can make your website safe without needing a lot of money or coding skills. Just follow these steps—get an SSL certificate, set up strong login security, back up your website regularly, update all your software, use a firewall, manage your website well, and stay alert.

If you have any questions about keeping your website secure, ask me in the comments!