Easyapache-4 News!!!

EasyApache 4 was introduced in cPanel & WHM version 11.52 and has grown into a stable product. As of version 58 EasyApache 4 is out of BETA, and is the default for any new cPanel installation.

Why EasyApache 4 I want to tell you :

Building with EasyApache 4 is Fast

No need to full recompile of Apache and PHP for adding new module. With EasyApache 4 deliver Apache, PHP, and our supported PHP modules as RPMs, which means that adding a new module takes seconds.
Updates are Automatic with EasyApache 4

Since EasyApache 4 is all RPM based, the operating system automatically takes care of updates for you
PHP7 Support included in EasyApache 4

PHP7 will only be available for cPanel & WHM customers as part of EasyApache 4. cPanel already considering adding PHP 7.1, which just entered its third Alpha.

Multiple versions of PHP supported :EasyApache 4

With cPanel & WHM version 58, We are adding the ability to mange multiple PHP versions from WHM.
Easy to switch to EasyApache 4

Switching on easyapache4 is easy to do using our simple command-line script, and the conversion process requires no additional work from you

All EasyApache RPMs are open source and available on github! Advanced users who want to customize the EasyApache 4 RPMs provided by cPanel can do so with ease!

So Get Set Go!!!!!

free memory available in your Dedicated Server !!!

The command “free“ is used to check the RAM usages in the server. First of all, let us familiarise about the output of that command. The output of the command is as follows:

free o/p

In this example, the total amount of available memory is 1048576 KB. 570264 KB is used by processes and 478312 KB is free for other applications. Do not get confused, as the first line shows that 152280 KB is free! It is clear from the example that most of the memory used is for buffers and cache.

some terms related to cache:

Page Cache:

When a process like read or write a file is executed, a copy of the file is being modified in the main memory at the back end. Actually this scenario is performed by the kernel of the OS. So when the read or write process is executed, the kernel first looks for the copy of the file. And if no such copy exists it will create that copy of the file from the disk and writes back changes, whenever the modification is performed. So the memory taken up by these copies is called cached memory or page cache.

Clean Cache Page and Dirty Cache Page:

In this case, the kernel allocates one new page of cache memory and fills it with contents to be read out from the disk. When the user only reads the file the page will be marked as a ‘Clean’ cache page and when the user writes the file then that page will be marked as ‘Dirty’ cache page.

The memory issues in the Linux servers can be overcome by controlling the usage of page cache from the total memory in the server. Controlling of the page cache is done by changing the page cache kernel parameters. The lower the percentage, the more the system favors reclaiming unmapped page cache memory over mapped memory. High values (like the default value of 100) are not recommended for databases.

how we can limit the Page Cache or Cache Memory size.

Page cache phenomenon can consume as much memory as available in the machine for executing a process. It could be controlled only dynamically. And there is no particular kernel parameter to directly control page cache size. We could only limit the growth of page cache by tuning some configurable kernel parameters related to the page cache.

==> vm.vfs_cache_pressure (default = 100)

The parameter is used to control the tendency of the kernel to reclaim memory. Lowering this parameter causes the kernel to prefer and retain dentries and inodes caches and increasing this parameter beyond 100 causes the kernel to prefer to reclaim dentries and inodes.

==> vm.dirty_background_ratio ( default = 20)

The parameter is used to indicate the percentage of a system memory. Lowering this parameter will cause the pdflush to write away the dirty data sooner, and it will limit the size of the page cache.

==> vm.dirty_ratio (default=40)

The parameter is used to determine the percentage of the number of pages at which a particular process writes out the data for making the Dirty Cache page (Dirty data). Lowering this parameter will cause that particular process to write the Dirty data earlier, which will limit the page cache size.

==> vm.dirty_expire_centisecs ( default = 3000 , mentioned in milliseconds)

The parameter is used to determine the expiration time for the Dirty pages created so that they could equip themselves to be flushed out by the pdfush. Lowering the value will make more dirty pages to be eligible for flushing out, which would limit the page cache size.

==> vm.swappiness ( default=60)

The parameter is used to determine how soon you want to swap out the data during a process. The Higher parameter will cause the server more likely to swap and the lower parameter will cause the server less likely to swap. Thus, it will write data faster out of the disk and it will limit the Page cache size.

To change parameters dynamically on a running machine

Use the following command.

echo “500” > proc/sys/vm/vfs_cache_pressure

If you want persistent configuration make the modification to /etc/sysctl.conf.

sysctl -w vm.vfs_cache_pressure=”500″.

Stay tune to learn more on cache memory 🙂

How to Prevent Cybercriminals from Attacking

cyber-crime According to a 2013 Small Business Technology Survey that polled 845 small business owners across industries in the U.S., small businesses lost an estimated $8,700 as a result of a cyber attack. In addition, nearly half of all small business owners surveyed claimed to have at one time been the victim of a cyber attack. To protect yourself and your business from the unwanted costs (and headaches) that come from cyber attacks, follow the five recommendations outlined below:

Keep Computers Updated

One simple way you can prevent cybercriminals from hacking into your systems and stealing sensitive information is to by making sure your company computers are up to date. Your computer manufacturur likely releases regular updates to your operating system. Often times these updates are released for the purpose of addressing security issues or weaknesses that have been found. In order to prevent cybercriminals from attacking your machines in order to steal sensitive information, always follow through with installing recommended updates to your operating system. You should also update your browsers and other plugins you use.

Use Strong Passwords

As more and more sites continue to offer innovative ways for you to store information online, it’s becoming increasingly important to be proactive when it comes to keeping your accounts secure, and your personal information out of the hands of hackers and cybercriminals. When you create passwords for your business, you should always include the following four categories:

Uppercase letters (A,B,C)
Lowercase letters (a,b,c)
Numbers (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
Symbols found on the keyboard (~ ! @ # $ % ^ & * ( ) _ – + = { } [ ] | : ; ” ‘ < > , . ? /)

Educate Your Staff

In a Forbes article on small business cyber attacks, author George Westerman write the following, “internet security is not just a technology problem; it’s a people problem. According to CyberFactors, in-house employees commit about 40% of reported breaches. Some are disgruntled workers or ex-workers; some are serious bad guys. But often it’s people doing things they don’t even know are unsafe.” According to the article, Westerman recommends doing the following in order prevent cybercriminals from attacking your small business:

Train your employees on IT risk.
Create clear and simple company policies regarding technology.
Put somebody in charge of security.

Install Antivirus Software

Antivirus software is software used to prevent, detect and remove malware such as: computer viruses, malicious BHOs, hijackers, ransomware, keyloggers, backdoors, rootkits, trojan horses, worms, malicious LSPs, dialers, fraudtools, adware and spyware. As a business owner, it’s crucial that you invest in antivirus software for your computer computers. Antivirus software is especially essential for computers that have sensitive client account information on them. For a list of the best antivirus software tools of 2013,

Hire a Security Consultant To Determine How Secure Your Business Is

Another way you can prevent cybercriminals or hackers from attacking your small business is by hiring an IT or cyber security consultant to evaluate how secure your business is. These security specialists can perform a security audit for you, tell you where your vulnerabilities are, and make recommendations on how to make improvements. As more and more hackers continue to develop clever ways to access private data and steal sensitive information from businesses, more and more companies are hiring security consultants and white-hat hackers (i.e. the ones who know how to hack, but use their skills to help make businesses more secure) to help improve security infrastructure.

Stay Informed

One of the biggest ways you can prevent cybercriminals from attacking your small business is by simply being informed. You should be regularly educating yourself on cyber security issues as they relate to small business. By doing so, you can work to constantly improve your security based on what you learn from other businesses who are dealing with the same security issues as you. You can stay informed by reading small business blogs, looking for articles about cybercriminals and how they operate, and downloading timely reports that offer helpful, up-to-date data on cyber attacks.

Conclusion

As mentioned in the opening of this article, according to research, small businesses can lose an estimated $8,700 as a result of a cyber attack. As a business owner, it’s your job to be proactive when it comes to preventing cybercriminals and hackers from attacking your small business. You can get started by following the recommendations outlined above. What other tips do you have for business owners like you who understand the importance of keeping sensitive data out of the hands of cybercriminals and want to start developing and implementing more effective protection strategies?

Hardening WordPress Security

WordPress is the most popular blogging and CMS system on the Internet which makes it a favorite target for hackers. Having a WordPress site means that you have to take some extra efforts in order to protect your and your visitors data hence hardening your WordPress deployment is mandatory.

We know from experience that having your site hacked is not fun. That’s why, here at WebHostingWorld, we take security very seriously.
In line with our serious approach to security, our products are carefully optimized to be as secure as possible. There are, however, still a handful of potential security risks, when running a website, that we have no control over. You, the website owner, need to pay attention to these potential security risks, in order to keep your website safe.

With that in mind, here are few things you can do to improve your WordPress security.

1. Update all the things

It is really important to keep your core WordPress files and all of your plugins, themes updated to their latest versions. Every new release of WordPress contains patches and fixes that address real or potential vulnerabilities. If you don’t keep your website updated with the latest version of WordPress, you could be leaving yourself open to attacks.

Many hackers will intentionally target older versions of WordPress with known security issues, so keep an eye on your Dashboard notification area and don’t ignore those ‘Please update now’ messages.

Don’t ignore this!

The latest version of WordPress is always available on official WordPress site. Official release is not available from other websites or resources, thus, NEVER update WordPress from third party resources. Also, you can easily update WordPress from Admin Dashboard directly

WordPress update

It is strongly recommended to update your plugins and themes to the latest versions too, as a bug in one of these can affect your whole installation. You can update both plugins and themes via Admin Dashboard > choose Plugins or Themes menu and click ‘Update now’ near the necessary plugin or theme:

plugins update

themes update

NOTE: it is recommended to create backups of your WordPress files and database before applying any changes.

2. Strengthen up those passwords

You will be surprised to know that there are thousands of people that use phrases like “password” or “123456” for their admin login details. Needles to say, such passwords can be easily guessed and they are on the top of the list of any dictionary attack.

The goal with your password is to make it hard for other people to guess and hard for a brute force attack to succeed. Many automatic password generators are available that can be used to create secure passwords.

https://identitysafe.norton.com/password-generator/

Things to avoid when choosing a password:

Any permutation of your own real name, username, company name, or name of your website.
A word from a dictionary, in any language.
A short password.
Any numeric-only or alphabetic-only password (a mixture of both is best)

3. Don’t use the “admin” username

The default WordPress login is ‘admin’ and most hackers know that. It should be changed to custom one with a strong password which include upper/lower keys, numbers and symbols. If you’re installing a new WordPress site, you will be asked for username during the WordPress installation process.

installing WordPress

If you have already installed WordPress you can still change username.The easiest way to change your WordPress username is by creating a new user with your desired username and with the administrator user role. You will need to use a different email address than the one used by the old account.

To add a new user on your WordPress site, simply click on Users » Add New and fill out the form.

add-new-user-wordpress

Add a new user with Administrator role, make sure you use a strong password.
Now you need to logout and then login with the new user account you just created.
Go to the Users section and click on the Delete link under your old username
add user

While deleting your old user, WordPress will ask what you want to do with their content. Make sure that you click on ‘Attribute all content to:’ option and then select the new user you just created. Click on the ‘Confirm Deletion’ button to delete the old user account.

delete user

That’s all you have successfully changed your WordPress username

4. Protect your WordPress Admin Area

Keeping “wp-admin” folder protected adds an extra layer of protection. Whoever attempts to access files or directory after “wp-admin” will be prompt to login.

Protecting your “wp-admin” folder with login and password can be done in several ways:

4.1. WordPress plugin

Using the WordPress AskApache Password Protect plugin.

4.2. cPanel

You can set protection easily on any folder via cPanel’s Password Protect Directories

Go to cPanel > Security > Password Protect Directories to access a list of your site’s folders:

Password Protect Directories

Choose the directory you wish to protect and click on it

Password Protect Directories

Put a tick on Password protect this directory and name your protected directory, insert the username and password and click on Add or Modify the Authorized User button to save your changes:

4.3. .htaccess + htpasswd

Creating a password-protected folder can also be done easily by setting the folders you want to protect inside .htaccess and users allowed to access inside .htpasswd.

The best you can do is to get our home IP address (you can use a site like whatismyip.com for that) and add these lines to the .htaccess file in your WordPress admin folder replacing xx.xxx.xxx.xxx with your IP address.

<Files wp-login.php>
order deny,allow
Deny from all
Allow from xx.xxx.xxx.xxx
</Files>
In case you want to allow access to multiple computers (like your office, home PC, laptop, etc.), simply add another Allow from xx.xxx.xxx.xxx statement on a new line.

5. Securing wp-config.php

It is very important to protect wp-config.php file and wp-admin folder since they are more susceptible for hacker attack.

Move wp-config.php outside of the web directory (eg. one directory up). WordPress knows to look for the file in other directories if it can’t find it in the web directory.

The trouble is, if a hacker managed to gain access to your admin panel, they could also edit your files that way, and execute whatever code they wanted to.

So it’s a good idea to disable this method of file editing, by adding the following to your wp-config.php file. You can put this in that file (at the very top) to deny access to anyone surfing for it:

<files wp-config.php>
order allow,deny
deny from all
</files>

The WordPress Dashboard by default allows administrators to edit PHP files, such as plugin and theme files. This is often the first tool an attacker will use if able to login, since it allows code execution. WordPress has a constant to disable editing from Dashboard. Placing this line in wp-config.php is equivalent to removing the ‘edit_themes’, ‘edit_plugins’ and ‘edit_files’ capabilities of all users:

define(‘DISALLOW_FILE_EDIT’,true);

6.Changing database prefix

Your website might be at stake if you are using the predictable wp_ prefixes in your database.

This one can be difficult to do but it is the absolute most critical. By default, WordPress prefixes all its database tables “wp_”. Changing the table prefix to a random string makes it difficult if not impossible for a hacker to execute remote SQL injection attacks.

If you haven’t installed WordPress yet, then during installation you can change the table prefix to the random string you generated previously. Make sure you add an underscore ( _ ) after the string so your tables are easier to read.

changing table prefix

If you have already installed WordPress you can still change database prefix in two ways: either manually or using a special plugin.

For manual database prefix change, go to cPanel > phpMyAdmin menu > choose the necessary database from the left side > click on SQL option above.

Here you need to run RENAME SQL queries on tables in your WordPress database:

RENAME table `wp_commentmeta` TO `newprefix_commentmeta`;
RENAME table `wp_comments` TO `newprefix_comments`;
RENAME table `wp_links` TO `newprefix_links`;
RENAME table `wp_options` TO `newprefix_options`;
RENAME table `wp_postmeta` TO `newprefix_postmeta`;
RENAME table `wp_posts` TO `newprefix_posts`;
RENAME table `wp_terms` TO `newprefix_terms`;
RENAME table `wp_term_relationships` TO `newprefix_term_relationships`;
RENAME table `wp_term_taxonomy` TO `newprefix_term_taxonomy`;
RENAME table `wp_usermeta` TO `newprefix_usermeta`;
RENAME table `wp_users` TO `newprefix_users`;

*where newprefix_ should be replaced with new database prefix you wish to have instead of wp_, then click Go:

sql query

Once done, you will see the new database prefix has been applied to your WordPress database:

table prefix

After that you will need to search the options table for any other fields that is using wp_ as a prefix in order to replace them. It is necessary to run the following query in the same way:

SELECT * FROM `newprefix_options` WHERE `option_name` LIKE ‘%wp_%’

options table

Then click Go and you will get the result as on the screenshot below:

table prefix

Here you will need to go one by one to change these lines and replace the old database prefix with the new one. Once done, we need to search the usermeta for all fields that is using wp_ as a prefix with the help of this SQL query:

SELECT * FROM `newprefix_usermeta` WHERE `meta_key` LIKE ‘%wp_%’

sql query

After that click Go and the following results will appear:

changing database prefix

Number of entries may vary on how many plugins you are using and such. Here you need to change everything that has wp_ to the new prefix as well.

Once done, make sure to update your wp-config.php file with new database prefix:

changing database prefix in wp-config.php

Also, you can change database prefix using special plugins, like Change DB prefix or Change table prefix.

7. Plugins For Better Security

7.1. WP DB Backup

WP DB Backup is an easy to use plugin which lets you backup your core WordPress database tables just by a few clicks. Besides it is so easy, it
has also been one of the most used plugin to secure your WP-powered website.

7.2. WP Security Scan

With this plugin, scanning your WordPress-powered site will be a simple task. It finds the vulnerabilities in your site and offer useful tips on removing them.

7.3. User Locker

If you want to avoid brute-force hacking your site, then the User Locker plugin is right for you. It works on the same system as Login
Lockdown, however, it’s a 5-stars rated WP plugin which has a great fame among its users. With this plugin, scanning your WordPress-powered site will be a simple task. It finds the vulnerabilities in your site and offer useful tips on
removing them.

8. Keeping the backups

Back up your data regularly, including your MySQL databases. A sound backup strategy could include keeping a set of regularly-timed snapshots of your entire WordPress installation (including WordPress core files and your database) in a trusted location.

The following is a very simple version of how to use phpMyAdmin to back up your WordPress database.

1. Click on Databases in your phpMyAdmin panel. (It may not be necessary to do this, depending on your version of phpMyAdmin)

database backup

You may have several databases. Click the one that holds your WordPress data, the database you created when you installed WordPress.
Below is a picture of the default tables in the Structure view tab. You may have more tables — this would happen if you have any statistics plugins or anti-spam plugins.

database structure

Click Export. There are two methods to export, Quick and Custom; if you choose Custom, follow these steps:

1.1. Select all the tables.
1.2. In the Output section check Save output to a file and select None for Compression. (If your database is very large use a compression method)
1.3. Select SQL from the Format drop-down menu.
1.4. Check “Add DROP TABLE”: this can be useful for over-writing an existing database.
1.5. Check “IF NOT EXISTS”: this prevents errors during restores if the tables are already there.
1.6. Click Go. The data will now be saved into your computer.

Keep these files safe, copied and stored in separate places on separate media.

The tips provided above do not guarantee 100% secure of your WordPress website, however, they drastically decrease chances of getting hacked. We sincerely hope this article helped you enough in securing your online business and becoming a trouble-free and happy customer.

Learn about robots.txt file

The robots exclusion protocol (REP), or robots.txt is a text file webmasters create to instruct robots (typically search engine robots) how to crawl and index pages on their website.
Robots.txt is a text (not html) file you put on your site to tell search robots which pages you would like them not to visit. Robots.txt is by no
means mandatory for search engines but generally search engines obey what they are asked not to do. It is important to clarify that robots.txt
is not a way from preventing search engines from crawling your site (i.e. it is not a firewall, or a kind of password protection) and the fact that
you put a robots.txt file is something like putting a note “Please, do not enter” on an unlocked door – e.g. you cannot prevent thieves from
coming in but the good guys will not open to door and enter. That is why we say that if you have really sensitive data, it is too naïve to
rely on robots.txt to protect it from being indexed and displayed in search results.

robots.txt

When a search engine crawls (visits) your website, the first thing it looks for is your robots.txt file. This file tells search engines what they should and should not index (save and make available as search results to the public). It also may indicate the location of your XML sitemap.

Google’s official stance on the robots.txt file

Robots.txt file consists of lines which contain two fields: line with a user-agent name (search engine crawlers) and one or several lines starting
with the directive

How to create a robots.txt file

You will need to create it in the top-level directory of your web server.

When a robot looks for the “/robots.txt” file for URL, it strips the path component from the URL (everything from the first single slash), and puts “/robots.txt” in its place.

For example, for “http://www.example.com/shop/index.html, it will remove the “/shop/index.html“, and replace it with “/robots.txt“, and will end up with “http://www.example.com/robots.txt”.

So, as a web site owner you need to put it in the right place on your web server for that resulting URL to work. Usually that is the same place where you put your web site’s main “index.html” welcome page. Where exactly that is, and how to put the file there, depends on your web server software.

Remember to use all lower case for the filename: “robots.txt“, not “Robots.TXT.

You can simply create a blank file and name it robots.txt. This will reduce site errors and allow all search engines to rank anything they want.

Here’s a simple robots.txt file:

User-agent: *
Allow: /wp-content/uploads/
Disallow: /

1. The first line explains which agent (crawler) the rule applies to. In this case, User-agent: * means the rule applies to every crawler.

2. The subsequent lines set what paths can (or cannot) be indexed. Allow: /wp-content/uploads/allows crawling through your uploads folder (images) and Disallow: / means no file or page should be indexed aside from what’s been allowed previously. You can have multiple rules for a given crawler.

3. The rules for different crawlers can be listed in sequence, in the same file.

Examples of usage

robots-allow-all

Prevent the whole site from indexation by all web crawlers:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /

Allow all web crawlers to index the whole site:

User-agent: *
Disallow:

Prevent only several directories from indexation:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /cgi-bin/

Prevent site’s indexation by a specific web crawler:

User-agent: Bot1
Disallow: /

Robots.txt for WordPress

Running WordPress, you want search engines to crawl and index your posts and pages, but not your core WP files and directories. You also want to make sure that feeds and trackbacks aren’t included in the search results. It’s also good practice to declare a sitemap. So in case you didn’t create yet a real robots.txt, create one with any text editor and upload it to the root directory of your server via FTP.

Blocking main WordPress Directories

There are 3 standard directories in every WordPress installation – wp-content, wp-admin, wp-includes that don’t need to be indexed.

Don’t choose to disallow the whole wp-content folder though, as it contains an ‘uploads’ subfolder with your site’s media files that you don’t want to be blocked. That’s why you need to proceed as follows:

User-Agent: *
# disallow all files in these directories
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/
Disallow: /wp-content/themes/

Miscellaneous remarks
Don’t list all your files in the robots.txt file. Listing the files allows people to find files that you don’t want them to find.
Don’t block CSS, Javascript and other resource files by default. This prevents Google bot from properly rendering the page and understanding that your site is mobile-optimized
An incorrect robots.txt file can block Googlebot from indexing your page
Put your most specific directives first, and your more inclusive ones (with wildcards) last

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