Secure Hosting WP Blog
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What Is ‘Error Establishing a Database Connection’ & How To Fix It in WordPress
Experiencing the ‘Error Establishing a Database Connection‘ on your WordPress website? This common error indicates that your site is unable to connect to its database, rendering it inaccessible to users — and potentially impacting your visitors, user experience, and...
Wordfence Intelligence Weekly WordPress Vulnerability Report (September 11, 2023 to September 17, 2023)
Last week, there were 55 vulnerabilities disclosed in 46 WordPress Plugins and no WordPress themes that have been added to the Wordfence Intelligence Vulnerability Database, and there were 15 Vulnerability Researchers that contributed to WordPress Security last week....
How to Find & Fix Japanese SEO Spam
Japanese SEO Spam, also known as “Japanese keyword hack” or “Japanese SEO poisoning,” is a spammy search engine optimization technique used by black hat SEO artists to make a website show up in search engine results for spam keywords in Japanese language when they...
Two PHP Object Injection Vulnerabilities Fixed in Essential Blocks
On August 18, 2023, the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for two PHP Object Injection vulnerabilities in the Essential Blocks plugin for WordPress, a plugin with over 100,000 installations. We received a response three...
What is Secure Shell (SSH) & How to Use It: Security & Best Practices
Navigating your WordPress site’s dashboard can provide you with significant control over your website’s functionality and appearance. Yet it won’t offer a direct interaction or management of your server. This is where Secure Shell Access (SSH) steps in. SSH is a...
Wordfence Intelligence Weekly WordPress Vulnerability Report (September 4, 2023 to September 10, 2023)
Last week, there were 107 vulnerabilities disclosed in 89 WordPress Plugins and 5 WordPress themes that have been added to the Wordfence Intelligence Vulnerability Database, and there were 36 Vulnerability Researchers that contributed to WordPress Security last week....
Malware Scanning: An Essential Layer of Website Security
Wordfence recently launched Wordfence CLI, a high performance command line malware scanner, which makes use of our extensive set of malware detection signatures to rapidly scan file systems for infections. In recent years, the WordPress community has seen a shift in...
Decoding Magecart: Credit Card Skimmers Concealed Through Pixels & Images
MageCart infections most often come in the form of complex, obfuscated JavaScript injected into Magento database tables such as core_config_data, or as malicious plugins or core file injections installed into WordPress / WooCommerce environments (which are...
Over 100,000 WordPress Websites Affected by XSS and SQLi Vulnerabilities in Slimstat Analytics Plugin
On August 24, 2023, our Wordfence Threat Intelligence team identified and began the responsible disclosure process for a stored Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) and a Blind SQL Injection vulnerability in the Slimstat Analytics plugin, which is actively installed on more...
How to Fix “Not Secure” Warnings and SSL Issues in WordPress (8 Steps)
If you own a WordPress website and ever encountered the “Not Secure” warning, you might have worried that visitors would perceive your site as spam or fraudulent. Not only does this warning impact user trust, but it can also affect your site’s SEO because search...
Wordfence Intelligence Weekly WordPress Vulnerability Report (August 28, 2023 to September 3, 2023)
Last week, there were 64 vulnerabilities disclosed in 61 WordPress Plugins and 2 WordPress themes that have been added to the Wordfence Intelligence Vulnerability Database, and there were 32 Vulnerability Researchers that contributed to WordPress Security last week....
Stored Cross-Site Scripting Vulnerability Patched in Newsletter WordPress Plugin
On August 16, 2023, our Wordfence Threat Intelligence team identified and began the responsible disclosure process for a stored Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability in the Newsletter plugin, which is actively installed on more than 300,000 WordPress websites. The...
Bogus URL Shorteners Go Mobile-Only in AdSense Fraud Campaign
Since September 2022, our team has been tracking a bogus URL shortener redirect campaign that started with just a single domain: ois[.]is. By the beginning of 2023, this malware campaign had expanded to over a hundred domain names to redirect traffic to low quality...
How to Quickly Find & Fix Mixed Content Issues (SSL/HTTPS)
With the web’s increased emphasis on security, all sites should operate on HTTPS. Installing an SSL certificate allows you to make that transition with your website. But it can also have an unintended consequence for sites that have been operating on HTTP previously:...
WordPress Vulnerability & Patch Roundup August 2023
Vulnerability reports and responsible disclosures are essential for website security awareness and education. Automated attacks targeting known software vulnerabilities are one of the leading causes of website compromises. To help educate website owners on emerging...
Wordfence Intelligence Weekly WordPress Vulnerability Report (August 21, 2023 to August 27, 2023)
Last week, there were 43 vulnerabilities disclosed in 38 WordPress Plugins and no WordPress themes that have been added to the Wordfence Intelligence Vulnerability Database, and there were 23 Vulnerability Researchers that contributed to WordPress Security last week....
Introducing Free Wordfence Intelligence WordPress Vulnerability Webhook Notifications!
We’re incredibly excited to announce that we have launched a webhook integration for vulnerabilities as part of Wordfence Intelligence, which enables users to stay on top of the latest vulnerabilities being added to the Wordfence Intelligence WordPress Vulnerability...
Compromised OpenCart Payment Module Steals Credit Card Information
Today’s story starts much the same as many others on this blog: A new client came to us reporting that credit card details were being compromised from their checkout page. The website owner had even been contacted by a major credit card company who had identified...
Why WordPress Gets Hacked
A question we frequently get from new users as they’re onboarding is: why does WordPress get hacked? Of course, this question makes sense in this context; it’s extremely frustrating to find out that your WordPress website has been compromised and you need to tackle an...
Introducing Wordfence CLI: A High Performance Malware Scanner Built for the Command Line
Today, we are incredibly excited to announce the launch of Wordfence CLI: an open source, high performance malware scanner built for the command-line. With Wordfence CLI you can detect malware and other indicators of compromise on a host system by running an extremely...
WordPress News
WordPress 5.8 Beta 3
WordPress 5.8 Beta 3 is now available for testing! This software is still in development, so it is not recommended to run this version on a production site. Consider setting up a test site to play with it. You can test the WordPress 5.8 Beta 3 in three ways:...
WP Briefing: Episode 11: WordCamp Europe 2021 in Review
In this episode, Josepha Haden Chomphosy does a mini deep dive into WordCamp Europe 2021, specifically the conversation between the project’s co-founder, Matt Mullenweg, and Brian Krogsgard formerly of PostStatus. Tune in to hear her take and for this episode’s small...
WordPress 5.8 Beta 2
WordPress 5.8 Beta 2 is now available for testing! This software is still in development, so it’s not recommended to run this version on a production site. Consider setting up a test site to play with it. You can test the WordPress 5.8 Beta 2 in two ways:...
WordPress 5.5.1 Maintenance Release
WordPress 5.5.1 is now available! This maintenance release features 34 bug fixes, 5 enhancements, and 5 bug fixes for the block editor. These bugs affect WordPress version 5.5, so you’ll want to upgrade. You can download WordPress 5.5.1 directly, or visit...
The Month in WordPress: August 2020
August was special for WordPress lovers, as one of the most anticipated releases, WordPress 5.5, was launched. The month also saw several updates from various contributor teams, including the soft-launch of the Learn WordPress project and updates to Gutenberg. Read on...