Your website is important to your success as a startup: it’s the face of your company and potentially your primary revenue source and lead generation. Nonetheless, an unknown threat puts your website and company at risk every day: cyber-attacks.
Every day, the average website experiences 59 attacks, one of which may result in stolen customer data, search engine blacklisting or the web host suspending. Also, a successful attack on your site could affect sales, tarnish your reputation and degrade customer loyalty. Many website owners believe their websites are inherently secure. Or that website security is the responsibility of another party, such as a hosting provider.
While your hosting company keeps your site hosted on secure server, it is your responsibility to secure your website. You may think of it as protecting an apartment building–property management (or web host) ensures that the building is up to code. But it is the duty of each occupant (or website owner) to lock the doors and windows of the building.
Don’t worry it’s easier to secure your website than you thought! You can concentrate all your energies on growing your business by following these four simple steps, realizing that your website is secured from every angle.
Install SSL Security Certificate
Even if you aren’t familiar with the term, you’re likely already familiar with SSL certificates. If you’ve ever noticed a URL that begins with “https”. Also, a lock logo with the word “Secure” in your browser bar. Then you’ve found a website that has an SSL certificate installed. This means that sensitive information, like login credentials or credit card numbers, is encrypted as it passes between the website and its server. The certificate does not actually protect information on the website itself. But it does prevent cybercriminals from intercepting the information in transit.
Many certificate providers offer certificates of trust that can be shown on your website. Statistics show that when visiting a website, 79 per cent of online shopper’s plan to see one. Even if your company does not deal with eCommerce. And your customers are confirmed by a confidence seal that your website is not only safe and secure but also legitimate. Think of it as an ID card for your website. And it proves that you are the verified owner of your website.
SSL certificates can also benefit the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) of your website which leads to increased traffic, visibility and credibility on the website. Google has given top priority to securing websites since 2014. And hoping to encourage more websites to switch from HTTP to HTTPS. It’s a lighter ranking factor than others but any drop in your SEO bucket is worthwhile with a new business and a new website. In addition, Google is now taking a heavier-handed stance as of January 2017. Websites that collect sensitive info without an SSL certificate will be mark in search results as “non-secure,”. Which might be the first impression your customers get from your business. Installing an SSL Certificate – no matter what type of business you are running – is an easy way to win the trust of new, potential customers right away.
Use a CAPTCHA
We’ve all experienced CAPTCHA tests, proving hundreds of times over that we are not robots. But do you know why they’re used?
Cybercriminals and spammers can use and misuse fillable forms on web sites–such as login fields or contact forms. Unprotected, these act as entry points where code can be insert to achieve a variety of malicious ends: stealing customer information, spreading spam, or even taking control of the entire web. It rarely happens by way of a hacker who attacks a website. Alternatively, they program bots to automatically crawl websites for vulnerabilities of these kinds. Although a CAPTCHA helps to keep the robots at bay, it can sometimes be a pain point for many companies. Antiquated CAPTCHA forms require a lot of effort from potential customers to complete, taking an average of 10 seconds. This caused great customer frustration and was often blamed for a negative impact on conversions.
Google’s reCAPTCHA has already begun to alter the CAPTCHA system’s effectiveness and simplicity. ReCAPTCHA can be solved in just as little as one click, instead of deciphering fuzzy audio or squiggly text. ReCAPTCHA is completely free-and does not need coding. Additionally, if you use a content management system (CMS) such as WordPress, adding a CAPTCHA to your website is as easy as installing a plugin.
Implement a WAF/CDN Combo
Imagine that you log on to your site one day and notice there’s been a huge surge in traffic. You may assume this is great news for your business, right? It could be – but it could also come from a swarm of malicious bots trying to overload your server. If a website is flood with invalid or automated requests, a DDoS attack happens, and the server is taken down. Website downtime can be incredibly costly and does not give a pleasant first impression to potential customers.
Yes, 40 percent of online shoppers are likely to click away from a website that takes longer than three seconds to load-and as loading time rises, so is the rate of abandonment. A WAF (web application firewall), which automatically prevents malicious traffic from reaching your site. This is one of the easiest ways to protect your site against a DDoS attack.
Working hard on the SEO at your site? You then know how important it is to avoid duplicating material – which is another cause for bots to think about. Bots known as “scrapers” can copy and post content from one website to another-creating duplicate content and harming the SEO of the original website.
As mentioned earlier, a slow-loading website will deter potential customers. So make sure that when it comes in you are ready to handle the inevitable flood of legitimate traffic. A content delivery network (CDN) uses data centres around the globe to store the content of a website, which reduces the loading time.
Use a Website Scanner
Without a website scanner that can automatically check for and delete malware, no Website security plan is complete. Malware is an ever-present threat which is still growing and becoming more difficult to detect. Four of six major trends in malware specialized in quietly infecting websites and staying undetected. An automated website scanner will track your website daily for potential threats, operating in the background while tending to your business.
The different types of malware can cause harm to your business in many ways, including stealing personal and financial data from your customers. Malware can also damage your business’s reputation by landing your website on Google’s blacklist.
When Google finds malware on your website, your visitors will be meet with an upsetting error message. And your website will be delete from the search results before Google cleans and re-crawls it. All too often, this is how website owners find malware on their site, and by then their website has been compromised for days. Blacklisting can have a devastating effect on the income and credibility of a website. Which is why Google fails on the cautionary side and only blacklists 23 per cent of compromised websites.
In order to keep malware off your website and your website off of Google’s blacklist. You’ll need to stay aware of potential security threats. The most effective way to combat malware is also the easiest: by employing a daily, file-based malware scanner on your website. Automatic scanning saves you time. And automated malware removal ensures that you can mitigate threats as they happen, minimizing their impact to your site and its visitors.
