If you’re running a website, you need to know how to make your website secure from hackers. The good news is that this is really more about common sense and discipline than about in-depth technical skills. Here’s what you need to know.
How to secure a website from hackers - Four key steps
When you’re looking at how to make your website secure from hackers, there are four key steps you need to know. These are as follows. Choose the right website-building options. Build security into the design of your website. Minimize and manage your internal users. Monitor your website both with tools and manually.
Choose the right website-building options
The basics of any website are a host and a content-management system. You can choose these separately, or opt for an all-in-one website-building solution. In either case, research your host carefully. There is no point in learning how to make your website secure from hackers if you’re just going to end up having it compromised by poor security on the part of your host.
If you opt for an all-in-one solution, you’ll be given access to a proprietary CMS as part of your package and the vendor will take care of all security. If you use an open-source CMS then it will be down to you to take the necessary steps to keep it secure. You will also need to ensure the security of any third-party extensions you use. In most cases, this means installing them correctly, choosing the right settings for your needs, and, above all, keeping them updated.
Build security into the design of your website
If you’re creating a new website, set out the business processes that the website must fulfill. Then prioritize them. Start by designing the most-important process and work from there. Using this approach can make it much easier to meet tight deadlines without compromising security. In short, if necessary, you can launch a website that is only partly complete, knowing that it covers the essentials securely.
If you have an existing website and have never had a proper security review, then it’s advisable to undertake one as soon as possible, even if it means hiring a professional. The key point to remember is that security tools are intended to complement secure web design and implementation, not as a replacement for them.
Minimize and manage your internal users
Work out what tasks need to be performed on your website and what level of access is needed for people to perform these tasks. From this, you’ll be able to work out the minimum number of users you need and, specifically, the minimum number of admin users you need.
In an ideal world, this would be your exact number of users. In the real world, however, as a minimum, you’re going to need to think about covering staff absences. The people providing the cover will need to know what they’re doing so it might be helpful to have them do some of the work regularly so they keep in practice.
It’s also reasonable to balance the security of minimizing the number of users versus the need to have business processes moving along with a decent level of speed. The key point is to apply common sense and ensure that there is a justification for every user access granted rather than just handing them out to anyone who wants one.
On that note, all users should have their own, individual logins and sharing should be explicitly banned. Mandate the use of strong, unique passwords and enable two-factor authentication whenever possible. Have a process for creating new users quickly when needed and likewise make sure that user accesses are promptly revoked when they cease to be needed.
Monitor your website both with tools and manually
At the end of the day, a lot of successful hacking attacks succeed because people are too busy to monitor the website effectively. This means that they miss out on signs that hackers are working to exploit a weakness they might be able to fix.
As an absolute minimum, install a robust website vulnerability scanner on your website and make sure that all the devices in your organization are also protected by reputable security products. If people access your website using non-company-owned devices then make it a condition of employment/your contract that those devices are likewise protected.
If at all possible, make regular checks on your admin accounts, your activity logs, and your scheduled tasks (Cron jobs). Follow through by undertaking further checks on anything which appears to be out of the ordinary.
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Removal
Security stack layer 1
Malware Detect & Removal
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- Unsuspecting websites get infected with malicious code.
- Continuous website monitoring to detect any incidents.
- Identify and remediate the cause to hardening your websites.
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Response
Security stack layer 5
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- 24 / 7 / 365 security monitoring using state-of-the-art tech.
- Engage clients of complex threats to resolve the issue.
- Real-time web traffic monitoring and proactive incident fixes.
C.S.O.C. checks for threats, identifies and analysis then performs the necessary actions to resolve the issue while offloading costs of in-house experts by using stack layer 3 to handle the heavy lifting.
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Intelligence
Security stack layer 3
Security Information • Event Management
S.I.E.M. collects logs and events the network traffic and web assets, security devices, operating systems, applications, databases, and reviews the vulnerabilities using artificial intelligence to process.
- Reduces billions of events into prioritized threats real-time.
- Identifies changes in network behavior with activity baselines.
- Flows data searches in real-time streaming or historical mode.
S.I.E.M. senses and tracks significant threats to links to all online supporting data and context for easier investigation. While anomaly detection to identify changes associated with the network safety.
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Prevention
Security stack layer 4
Web Application Firewall
W.A.F. by Comodo eliminates application vulnerabilities to protect websites and web applications against advanced attacks including Denial-of-Service (DDoS), SQL Injection and Cross-Site Scripting.
- Destroys malicious requests and thwart hack attempts.
- Protection to account registration forms and login pages.
- Malicious bots and brute force attacks are block and patched.
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Security stack layer 2
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- Proven to increase search engine rankings and site scores.
- 29 worldwide CDN node locations to reach your users.
- Save your bandwidth by leveraging CDN browser caching.
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Compliance
Security stack layer 6
Payment Card Industry • Data Security Standard
PCI • DSS ensures that your customers' cardholder info is kept secure from security breaches through a meticulous scan of your network and applications to identify and fix security vulnerabilities.
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- Pass the requirements for the 12 points PCI • DSS standard.
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