The Moz Q&A Forum

    • Forum
    • Questions
    • My Q&A
    • Users
    • Ask the Community

    Welcome to the Q&A Forum

    Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

    1. SEO and Digital Marketing Q&A Forum
    2. Categories
    3. Content & Blogging
    4. 1,023 blocked malicious login attempts. Who trying to steal my blog? Any advises?

    1,023 blocked malicious login attempts. Who trying to steal my blog? Any advises?

    Content & Blogging
    15 7 10.1k
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as question
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with topic management privileges can see it.
    • VicMarcusNWI
      VicMarcusNWI last edited by

      This is a very common thing. Most of these attacks are automated, coming from China or Eastern Europe. You may consider banning traffic from those countries all together if it's not relevant to you. Change the default admin user name to something else. And do as EGOL recommended - set a really strong password. And then change that password every few months.

      Eslam-yosef 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
      • max.favilli
        max.favilli last edited by

        Change the name of the login page, I mean in addition to having a strong password of course.

        Those automated scripts look first for the known wp login page if they don't find it the will give up, if they do they will keep trying forever and ever, an unecessary load for your servers.

        Eslam-yosef 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 4
        • donford
          donford last edited by

          I agree with Massimillano here.

          Three things you should do for all common CMS systems (WP, Joomla, ect..)

          First change the admin directory to something else. When doing this you likely have to edit configuration files to point to the new location which is pretty simple.

          Second protect admin directory with .htaccess & .htpasswd.  There is a nice generator I have used on some of my sites in the past here.

          Third create a honeypot / auto IP ban for malicious crawlers or script kiddies. There are several plugins for this if you search the keywords honeypot + cms.

          Eslam-yosef 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
          • Eslam-yosef
            Eslam-yosef @EGOL last edited by

            I've. But, do you think it's enough. I'm talking about that I'm talking with you right now and there's someone right there trying to steal my thing. Hard feeling really.

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • Eslam-yosef
              Eslam-yosef @VicMarcusNWI last edited by

              I don't know, it's a very abuse thing to ban traffic from a country. If you are saying these attacks are automated so they are not humans?

              VicMarcusNWI 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • Eslam-yosef
                Eslam-yosef @max.favilli last edited by

                I don't think it's easy to change it because there PHP complicated things that I don't know about. But, I will search for a trusted plugin or something like that. Seems like a good solution.

                max.favilli 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • Eslam-yosef
                  Eslam-yosef @donford last edited by

                  It's won't type my password there really. I don't know ...

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • max.favilli
                    max.favilli @Eslam-yosef last edited by

                    Instructions here: https://wordpress.org/support/topic/how-to-change-from-wp-loginphp-to-login

                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • aap82
                      aap82 last edited by

                      theres a wordpress plugin you can use that limits the number of login attempts (I used to use it but I forgot the name of it)

                      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • ScottOlson
                        ScottOlson last edited by

                        Bulletproof Security is great and has many features to blocking such attempts and making it harder for those scripts that are just constantly scanning for the usual vulnerabilities.

                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • VicMarcusNWI
                          VicMarcusNWI @Eslam-yosef last edited by

                          Eslam - Many great suggestions here of the things you can do right now to help you with these hack attempts. One thing I'd like to add is that we use a service/plugin called Sucuri. We've had good luck with it so far. You can learn more about them here: http://sucuri.net/

                          Regarding the approach of blocking traffic from other countries, my thought is this. Does traffic from those countries bring any value to you and do you give value to those visitors? If you answer no to this question, then why not block it? For example, a local pizza shop's website in Portland, Oregon probably doesn't care bout web traffic from Lithuania and vice versa.

                          max.favilli 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • max.favilli
                            max.favilli @VicMarcusNWI last edited by

                            Honestly, I would strongly suggest to avoid blocking traffic on a geographic basis, these days you never know where traffic will come from and why.

                            User sitting in the building next to yours but accessing internet from a corporate network may appear as connecting from China.

                            Legit bot from services you are paying for may appear as crawling from Sweden, and other legit bot you don't even know about but which let you reach additional audience may appear as connecting from the other side of the world.

                            Blocking traffic is positively dangerous, the only case where I would consider it a good decision is when blocking blacklisted ips, and even this case I would suggest to secure the blacklist is updated regularly to avoid blocking false positive.

                            VicMarcusNWI 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                            • VicMarcusNWI
                              VicMarcusNWI @max.favilli last edited by

                              There will definitely be cases out there like you described, Massimiliano. It's a wild world out there. We can only do so much to protect ourselves.

                              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                              • 1 / 1
                              • First post
                                Last post
                              • Blogging , do I create a huge blog which links to all my sites
                                NickW816
                                NickW816
                                1
                                2
                                44

                              • Embed WordPress blog into site or /blog?
                                SearchOptimization
                                SearchOptimization
                                0
                                3
                                160

                              • Same content on site blog as a separate blog. Will unpublishing on one blog evade duplicate content issues?
                                Nlevi
                                Nlevi
                                0
                                2
                                86

                              • Guest blog better than owned blog?
                                ThompsonPaul
                                ThompsonPaul
                                0
                                7
                                203

                              • Are there quality blog sites allowing guest blogging ?
                                MoosaHemani
                                MoosaHemani
                                0
                                4
                                575

                              • Best place for a blog blog.mydomain.com or mydomain.com/blog
                                Pure710
                                Pure710
                                0
                                6
                                4.6k

                              • Blogging
                                SEODinosaur
                                SEODinosaur
                                0
                                5
                                404

                              • I have created 2 blogs for a client as they have 2 domains (1 for their core business, and 1 for a product). I want to use the same content on both blogs. What is the best way to set this up so there are no ranking or duplicate content issues?
                                Paligap
                                Paligap
                                0
                                8
                                525

                              Get started with Moz Pro!

                              Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

                              Start my free trial
                              Products
                              • Moz Pro
                              • Moz Local
                              • Moz API
                              • Moz Data
                              • STAT
                              • Product Updates
                              Moz Solutions
                              • SMB Solutions
                              • Agency Solutions
                              • Enterprise Solutions
                              • Digital Marketers
                              Free SEO Tools
                              • Domain Authority Checker
                              • Link Explorer
                              • Keyword Explorer
                              • Competitive Research
                              • Brand Authority Checker
                              • Local Citation Checker
                              • MozBar Extension
                              • MozCast
                              Resources
                              • Blog
                              • SEO Learning Center
                              • Help Hub
                              • Beginner's Guide to SEO
                              • How-to Guides
                              • Moz Academy
                              • API Docs
                              About Moz
                              • About
                              • Team
                              • Careers
                              • Contact
                              Why Moz
                              • Case Studies
                              • Testimonials
                              Get Involved
                              • Become an Affiliate
                              • MozCon
                              • Webinars
                              • Practical Marketer Series
                              • MozPod
                              Connect with us

                              Contact the Help team

                              Join our newsletter
                              Moz logo
                              © 2021 - 2026 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
                              • Accessibility
                              • Terms of Use
                              • Privacy