WordPress is one of the most popular website building tools in the world because it offers powerful features and a secure encryption base. However, that does not protect WordPress or any other software from malicious DDoS attacks, which are common on the internet.
DDoS attacks can slow down websites and ultimately make them inaccessible to users. These attacks can be targeted at both small and large websites.
Now, you may be wondering how can a small business website using WordPress prevent such DDoS attacks with limited resources?
In this tutorial, we will show you how to effectively prevent and prevent a DDoS attack on WordPress. Our goal is to help you learn how to manage your site's security against a DDoS attack like a pro.
What is a DDoS attack?
DDoS attacks, short for Distributed Denial of Service attacks, are a type of network attack that uses compromised computers and devices to send or request data from the WordPress host server. The purpose of these requests is to slow down and eventually bring down the target server.
DDoS attacks are a growing form of DoS (Denial of Service) attacks. Unlike a DoS attack, they leverage multiple compromised machines or servers spread across different areas.
These compromised machines form a network, sometimes called a botnet. Each affected machine acts as a bot and launches attacks on the targeted system or server.
This allows them to go unnoticed for a while and cause maximum damage before they are blocked.
Even the largest internet companies are vulnerable to DDoS attacks.
In 2018, GitHub, a popular code storage platform, witnessed a massive DDoS attack that sent 1.3 terabytes of traffic per second to their servers.
You may also remember the notorious 2016 attack on DYN (DNS service provider). This attack has covered news around the world because it affects many popular websites such as Amazon, Netflix, PayPal, Visa, AirBnB, New York Times, Reddit and thousands more.
Why do DDoS attacks occur?
There are several motivations behind DDoS attacks. Here are some common:
- Those who are tech-savvy, who are just bored and adventurous
- People and groups try to create a political perspective
- The group targets websites and services of a specific country or region
- The attacks target a specific business or service provider to harm them
- To extort money and collect ransom
What is the difference between Brute Force Attack and DDoS Attack?
Brute Force Attacks often tries to break into a system by guessing a password or trying a random combination for unauthorized access to the system.
DDoS attacks are completely used to simply take down the targeted system making it inaccessible or slowing it down.
What damages could be caused by a DDoS attack?
DDoS attacks can make a website unreachable or reduce performance. This can cause a bad user experience, loss of business, and the cost of mitigating attacks can cost thousands of dollars.
Below is a breakdown of these costs:
- Loss of business due to inability to access website
- Cost of customer support to answer questions regarding service disruptions
- Cost of minimizing attacks by hiring security or support services
- The biggest cost is bad user experience and brand reputation
How to stop and prevent DDoS attacks on WordPress
DDoS attacks can be cleverly disguised and difficult to deal with. However, with some basic security best practices, you can prevent and easily prevent DDoS attacks from affecting your WordPress site.
Here are the steps you need to take to prevent and prevent DDoS attacks on your WordPress site.
Removed DDoS / Brute Force Attack
The best thing about WordPress is that it is very flexible. WordPress allows third-party plugins and tools to integrate into your site and add new features.
To do that, WordPress provides several APIs for programmers. These APIs are the methods by which third-party WordPress plugins and services can interact with WordPress.
However, some of these APIs can also be exploited during a DDoS attack by sending tons of requests. You can safely disable them to reduce those requests.
Disable RPC XML in WordPress
XML-RPC allows third-party applications to interact with your WordPress site. For example, you need XML-RPC to use the WordPress application on your mobile device.
If you're like most non-mobile users, you can view the article disable XML-RPC by adding the following code to your site's .htaccess file.
Disable the REST API in WordPress
The WordPress JSON API allows plugins and tools to access WordPress data, update content and / or even delete it. This is how you can disable the REST API in WordPress.
The first thing you need to do is install and activate the plugin Disable the WP Rest API .
The plugin works fine and simply disables the REST API for all non-logged in users.
Activate WAF (Website application firewall)
Disabling attack vectors such as REST API and XML-RPC provides limited protection against DDoS attacks. Your website is still vulnerable to regular HTTP requests.
Although you can minimize a small DOS attack by trying to catch bad machine IPs and blocking them manually, this approach is not very effective when dealing with a large DDoS attack.
The easiest way to block suspicious requests is to activate the website application firewall.
The website application firewall acts as a proxy between your site and all incoming traffic. It uses smart algorithms to catch all suspicious requests and block them before they reach your web server.
We recommend using Sucuri because this is the best WordPress security plugin and website firewall. It runs at the DNS level meaning they can catch a DDoS attack before it can issue a request to your site.
Prices for Sucuri start at $ 20 per month (paid annually).
However, you can also use Cloudflare . However, Cloudflare's free service only provides limited DDoS protection. You will need to register at least their business plan to protect class 7 DDoS that costs about $ 200 per month.
Note: Website application firewall (WAF) running at application level will be less effective in DDoS attack. They block traffic when it has arrived at your web server, so it still affects your overall website performance.
Find out if it's Brute Force or DDoS Attack
Both brute force and DDoS attacks make heavy use of server resources, which means that their symptoms look quite similar. Your site will be slower and may crash.
You can easily find out whether it is a brute force attack or a DDoS attack by simply looking at the plugin's login reports. Sucuri .
Simple, just install and activate the plugin Sucuri free, then visit Sucuri Security » Login page final .
If you are seeing a large number of random login requests, then this means your wp administrator is under brute force attack.
Things to do in a DDoS attack
DDoS attacks can occur even if you have web application firewall and other safeguards. Companies like CloudFlare and Sucuri often deal with these attacks and most of the time you'll never hear about it because they can easily mitigate it.
However, in some cases, when these attacks are large, it can still impact you. In that case, it is best to be prepared to minimize problems that may arise during and after a DDoS attack.
Here are some things you can do to minimize the impact of a DDoS attack.
1. Notify your team members
If you have a group, you need to notify your colleague about this. This will help them prepare queries for customer support, review possible problems and help during or after the attack.
2. Inform customers about inconvenience
A DDoS attack can affect the user experience on your site. If you run a WooCommerce store, then your customers may not be able to place an order or log into their account.
You can notify via your social media accounts that your site is experiencing technical difficulties and things should be back to normal soon.
If the attack is big, then you can also use your email marketing service to contact customers and ask them to follow your social media updates.
If you have a VIP customer, then you might want to use your business phone service to make personal phone calls and let them know how you're working to restore the service.
Communicating during these difficult times makes a big difference in keeping your brand reputation strong.
3. Contact Hosting and Security Support
Please contact your WordPress hosting provider. The attack you may witness may be part of a larger attack on their system. In that case, they will be able to provide you with the latest updates on the situation.
Contact your Firewall service and let them know that your site is under DDoS attack. They can minimize the situation faster and can give you more information.
In firewall providers like Sucuri, you can also set your settings to Paranoid mode, which helps to block a lot of requests and makes your website accessible to normal users.
Keep your WordPress website safe
WordPress is quite safe out of the box. However, as the world's most popular website builder, it is often targeted by hackers.
Fortunately, there are many best practices you can apply to your website to make it even more secure.
We have compiled a complete step by step WordPress security guide for beginners. It will take you through the best WordPress security settings to protect your site and its data against common threats.
We hope this article helped you learn how to block and prevent DDoS attacks on WordPress.
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