Web hosting is one of the most overlooked yet vital parts of any successful website. However, selecting the best web hosting provider out of hundreds available can be quite a daunting task, even more so when you need the best possible option. A secure web hosting is a necessity because there are as many as 2,244 cyberattack attempts a day.
Online businesses are targets because there are hundreds of thousands of websites that can be attacked. Unfortunately, this does not exempt small businesses or bloggers. Even if you think that your website has nothing worth stealing, cybercriminals can make use of information obtained to attack several other websites. Also, they can access subscribers’ personal information through your site as well.
For these reasons, you should look at the must-haves of the most secure web hosting providers or, at the very least, look at how you can beef up the security of your WordPress website.
Backups and Hack Protection
Nothing beats proactive security. But then, sometimes, breaches are inevitable. If these breaches happen, you want to be sure your web hosting provider can get you back on your feet as quickly as possible. They can do this either through backups or hack protection guarantees. Starting from the latter, providers propose or, better yet, guarantee that they would be responsible for removing the malicious code if the website is breached. Some other sites feature automatic backups. This is the most recommended.
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Just like backups on your personal computers, all data on a website can be backed up. Several web hosting providers offer free backups to their clients. While some might need you to do a manual backup, others are automatic and require you to contact their support team if you need to restore data. It is highly recommended that you choose a web hosting provider that not only carries out periodic automated backups but allows you to restore data on your own and at any time. With this, the potential downtime of your website is reduced to the barest minimum. This is because you can restore the backup on your own and do not have to wait for the response from the support team.
To this effect, A2 Hosting and SiteGround are the best choices. With A2Hosting, you can back up your data offline. It also allows you to bring your site back to a previously saved point. SiteGround as well comes with easy-to-use backup and restore data features. Indeed, you can restore data, all with one click.
Firewalls and DDoS Protection
The most secure web hosting for your WordPress website is one that has a viable defense against DDoS attacks. DDoS, an acronym for Distributed Denial of Service, is a coordinated website attack. In these kinds of attacks, hackers attempt to flood the sites with a lot of incoming traffic. This, in turn, overwhelms the servers, causing a website to crash. Every website owner should keep an eye on such cyberattacks.
These attacks can be kept in check using a web hosting provider with an excellent Content Delivery Network (CDN). Examples of the ideal CDN include Cloudflare or a website firewall like Sucuri. Some websites include Cloudflare in their web hosting packages. One such example is A2 Hosting. Some others, like InMotion Hosting, do not incorporate Cloudflare in their hosting packages but allow it to be used regardless.
Firewalls are quite essential to beef up the security of your WordPress website as they serve as the first line of defense when intrusions are aimed at your site. In general, they monitor your website for potential threats and stop them right in their tracks before they get a chance to access your website.
Malware and Antivirus Scanning
When it comes to your personal computer, you are in charge of what types of antivirus or antimalware you choose to install. However, the situation is a bit different in terms of websites. You would usually depend on your web hosting provider to install and run the antimalware for you. You must be sure that your provider runs an efficient antimalware system. Also, find out what level of information about malware it can get.
While some web hosting providers give you access to their scan reports, some others do them as part of the overall web hosting package. When it comes to malware scanning of your WordPress website, BlueHost and HostGator are one of the very best. They run a system called SiteLock. This defense system comes as a separate add-on when you subscribe to their hosting plans. In addition to scanning your website for malware, it runs an integrated alert and removal tool to erase malware and viruses from your website.
Aside from efficient and proactive firewalls that prevent malware attacks, these malware scans are run to keep track of malware should it get into your web servers eventually. From the results of the scan, you can quickly identify loopholes and fix the problem yourself, or your web hosting provider can do that for you.
Spam Email Filtering
While this does not look like a big deal technically, it can be used to crash your website. A barrage of spam mail could have the same adverse effect on your website, as a DDoS attack would. However, if your hosting provider has a spam filter, this threat is nullified. This is because emails are first run through the spam filters, and if they are identified as spam, they are immediately removed.
In addition to keeping the spam mail away, spam filters help you free up space (that would otherwise be occupied by spam) in your mail folders. In general, WordPress hosting providers usually have spam filters. However, the most secure web hosting for your WordPress website is the one that comes with several different kinds. BlueHost, for example, has three different forms of spam protection for WordPress users.
Site Isolation
This is an essential factor when it comes to the security of WordPress websites. When it comes to cheap shared hosting plans, several websites are thrown on the same server without any isolation. Hence, if one website is vulnerable, others connected to the same server are too. That is, even if you are doing everything right, your website can still be targeted by cyberattacks because of someone else on the server.
This does not in any way imply that shared hosting is unreliable. However, if you are running your business on a budget, and you are using a shared hosting plan, ensure that your provider isolates your website from all others on the same server.
Conclusion
Many WordPress users assume that they will never be the victim of a cyberattack. It might interest you to know that 43% of cyberattacks are aimed at small businesses. It is essential that you only use a web hosting provider that offers adequate security.
Even if you are low on budget and can only afford shared hosting plans, do not be scared. There are web hosting plans that would fit seamlessly into your budget. When it comes to price and security, we recommend the following hosting providers: BlueHost, SiteGround, Kinsta, and A2 Hosting.