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    Author: Alexander

    • Updates for API method spam_check

      We have updated the data that is given out as a work result of the API of the spam_check method.

      Data is now sent for any records in the database. Previously, data sent if the records had the status BlackListed.

      Next parameters have been added:

      -spam_rate – a rating of spam activity from 0 to 100%. 100 means certain spam. The ratio of blocked requests to all. As an example: 100 requests have been made and 97 requests of them have been blocked so spam rate will be 97%.

      -frequency_time_10m – 10 minutes activity.
      -frequency_time_1h – 1 hour activity.
      -frequency_time_24h – 24 hours activity.

      Parameters “frequency_time” show how many attempts of spam attacks were caught.

      It allows you to make decisions more correctly and consider more parameters and you will get more information because of some of IP/email didn’t show by reason of low spam activity.

       

      Let us know if you have any questions.

    • ‘WordPress Security by CleanTalk’ Review– Is it Potent Enough to Safeguard you?

      ‘WordPress Security by CleanTalk’ Review– Is it Potent Enough to Safeguard you?

      WordPress is a very popular open source website creation tool. But this is not only a blogging platform, WordPress is an open source content management system used by millions of people worldwide. It is popular mainly because WordPress is very easy to use and easy to start with. Also, very good support from WordPress itself and different forums are available. According to a research, more than 22.5% of the websites are powered by WordPress in 2017.

      Due to its huge popularity and continuous growth as the world’s most used CMS, WordPress is naturally vulnerable to security threats and attacks. WordPress security attacks from the very beginning are handles by WordPress security releases. But there is new type of attacks is coming in the picture every day and everything does not come under WordPress Security Release. Here comes the WordPress Security Plugins.

      WordPress Security by CleanTalk is one of the most important security plugins which helps your WordPress site protected and secured from the Brute Force attacks by creating a firewall. Check out what kind of attacks your website may face and how can you secure yourself from these attacks:

      Why does a WordPress site is attacked anyway?Why does a WordPress site is attacked anyway?

      There is a cut-throat competition in the market in any venture and everyone wants to get the success at the end of the day. Due to the huge pressure, hackers want to access your website to get all the sensitive information, block your access from the site, redirect your users to any other malicious websites, remove or delete your user and all the content from the website or simply use the backlinks from your website. Stealing your backlink information and using it in their website will just improve their page ranks in any search engine.

      Most of the popular websites get thousands of attacks every week or even every day.

      How does a good security plugin work to prevent a different type of attacks on a WordPress site?

      There are several types of security attacks a WordPress website gets every day. A good security plugin applies optimized algorithms to prevent those vulnerabilities and keep the website secure. Following are some form of security threats a WordPress website gets:

      1. Malicious Software: After hitting your website, hackers leave some malicious software or script, also known as malware into your website. Your security plugin should scan all the files, contents, data files, database, changes in the DNS, comments or any kind of post to find out the malicious code that could possibly be hidden in the website’s source code, or URL. These malwares are scanned and removed by the WordPress security plugin.

      2. Brute Force Attacks: This type of attack is performed using permutation and combination of possible login information. Hackers attempt to log in to the website using thousands of possible username and password combination through automated scripts. Security plugins block the users with the attempt of too many login attempts or clicking on forgot password option. It also prevents WordPress from giving sensitive information like username or password hints etc. or multiple entry point options to the hackers.

      3. Zero Day Exploits: There are some obvious vulnerability issues in WordPress websites or any kind of website. Hackers attack those using bots. The security plugins use known algorithms and security firewall for these already published vulnerabilities and stop them.

      4. Spear Phishing and Social Engineering: Spear phishing & social engineering are among some techniques through which hackers can crack the most difficult password too. Security plugins provide a two-factor authentication which can neutralize the risk of password cracking. This facility is used by banks, financial institutions or websites with very sensitive data.

      5. Rate Based Throttling: This type of attack is the most critical type till date. Hackers overwhelm your website, database, servers and network, all resources using bots or automated scripts. This will prevent your genuine customers from accessing your website and search engine crawlers. Also, script crawlers aggressively crawl the website to overwhelm the website contents and resources. Security plugins provide security through IP blocking. If access request exceeds the accepted threshold of a maximum number of requests from any IP address, security plugin blocks that specific IP address. It also prevents the bot crawlers from aggressive crawling.

      6. Country attacks: Hackers using IPs of different countries and networks attack the WordPress websites to find vulnerabilities and overwhelm its resources with aggressive crawling. Security plugins use the same mechanism as rate based throttling, blocks the specific countries from accessing the website.

      7. Password Cracking: Security plugins use password auditing to find out the password of your admin account is weak or strong; suggest changing the password or making a rule to change the password monthly etc. This will prevent attackers to use password cracking or brute force attacking using the similar script.

      8. Spam Ads: Hackers often use the website they have compromised to post spam ads. These ads include a link to some other malicious website or simply a virus to download. Security Plugins scan your site regularly to check if there is any kind of spam ad that has been posted, identify and remove it.

      9. Hacker Reckon: Hackers find vulnerabilities using the information like software version, operating system version, and software installed etc. and security plugin prevents your WordPress website from giving this information anyhow to these hackers.

      What is WordPress Security Plugin by CleanTalk? 

      WordPress Security Plugin by CleanTalk is a premium security plugin for WordPress Site. This is an end to end protection system for a WordPress site which helps to prevent and securing a site from brute force attacks, brute force account counting, blocking IPs and users using a firewall, providing security for WordPress forms and backend filter malicious IPs, networks or countries.

      It also sends daily security logs, audit logs and reports through emails to the users so that user can analyze and monitor vulnerabilities to their WordPress Websites.

      How to Install Security Plugin by CleanTalk?

      Installation of Security Plugin by CleanTalk is very easy both through the automated and manual way. Following are the steps to follow to install WordPress Security by CleanTalk into your WP.

      Automated Installation

      1. Go to ‘Plugin’ option at the left panel of your WordPress and click on it.
      2. Search ‘WordPress Security by CleanTalk’.
      3. It will show the plugin on the page.
      4. Click on ‘Install Now’ button.
      5. Now click on the ‘Activate’ button
      6. Click on ‘Get access key Automatically’
      7. This will take you to the ‘Security Log’ page of the plugin.
      8. Click on ‘Save Changes’ option.

      Manual Installation

      Installation can be done manually too.

      1. You need to go to ‘https://wordpress.org/plugins/security-malware-firewall/#description’ and click on Download button.
      2. Zip file with an Installer will be downloaded. Save the installer and login to your site’s WP Admin.
      3. Click on ‘Add New’ button and then click on ‘Upload Plugin’
      4. Select the Zip file from the Dialog Box and click OK.
      5. The plugin will be installed. Then click on Activate
      6. The rest of the steps are similar.

      Features of WordPress Security Plugin

      Brute force attacks

      Brute force attacks are very different from cracks or in layman words ‘hacks’. Brute force attackers try to login into the WP admin using the easiest method of login, i.e., the username and password. They use permutations and combinations of common and most possible username and password to try logging in until they are successful. The easiest attack is the weakest link and username like ‘admin’ and password like’12456′.

      1. Brute force attacks come from different countries and IPs. If you have single access and IP, it is easy to block all the IPs other than your IP using the .htaccess file. But, if you have multiple users, log in from multiple locations, it is very difficult to identify the IP of the attacker and prevent it.
      2. WordPress Security plugin, blacklists all the IPs and users with too many attempts of login, scripts, failed attempts of forgot passwords. It also prevents WordPress from providing users multiple login points and giving away login information to the hackers. WordPress security plugin blocks or locks out any user who is using an invalid username and password.
      3. It sends email to the user as soon as a brute attack attempt is done. It also shows the attacker’s IP, location, and country through the email.

      Cleantalk Security Log

      Along with the plugin, Cleantalk security log is the additional feature which helps the user keep track on the logs for different events performed on their website.

      The security log consists of Date, Status, IP, Country and other details for the Admin Login for the user’s website for events like Login, Logout, Invalid Username, Invalid Email, Authentication Failed and Invalid Email. Logs can be filtered for different services like Anti- Spam, Hosting Anti-Spam, Database API, Site Security or SSL Certificates.

      Email Notifications

      Email notifications are very important and must have feature for any security firewall to have. Emails are sent to registered admin user’s email whenever an activity is logged in a WordPress site. WordPress Security by Cleantalk sends email for the following activities:

      Admin Login:
      It sends email to the registered admin user’s email so that the user is aware that an admin login has taken place on his website.

      New installation and Signup:

      Cleartalk WordPress Security plugin sends a notification to the user’s email when he installs and signs up for the plugin.

      Access Key:

      Email notification is sent when a user opts to get access key manually.

      Daily Security Report:

      Daily security Report email notification is sent to admin user which includes information about the SITE Time, Username, IP and Country and a number of brute attacks, failed login and authentication failures have taken place.

      CleanTalk Security Firewall

      The WordPress Security plugin security firewall works like a fence against the security attacks to a WordPress website. It uses CleanTalk database of bad IP’s and blocks the vulnerabilities from compromised IP’s. Firewall runs even before other codes run including the WordPress site and this prevents the security threats to attack the WordPress site. The firewall shields the site and blocks the threats even before they appear.

      And provides the WordPress sites security features like

      • Personal Blacklist Management
      • Country and IP blocking
      • Protection from aggressive users and web crawlers

      Traffic Control Analysis

      Traffic analysis is one of the important features for any WordPress website, in terms of security and CPU overloading. From which IP, country and location traffic is coming, the users that are online, who is on your page and how much time they have spent, etc. information is easily provided by the WordPress Security Plugin to the admin user.

      Unlike other plugins, it enables traffic control analysis to all the visitors even if they have not enabled javascript in their browsers. It gives information about visitors on traffic parameters like:

      • Date and Time of the visit to the website
      • Visitor’s spent time on the website
      • Source Country
      • Visitor’s IP Address
      • Browser
      • Operating System and version
      • Type of the visitor – Person, Bot, Search Bot or suspicious bot, script etc.
      • Number of page hits

      Cleartalk Traffic control can block the IP addresses from any country or any network from the interface itself. IP addresses will be automatically blocked by the Traffic Control if they exceed the threshold of the average page visit quantity. This helps the monitoring and blocking of the traffic real time.

      BlackIP Database

      This is the new feature launched by CleanTalk. BlackIP database is the collection of blocked or blacklisted IP addresses. This database helps to analyze which type of IPs, locations or countries from which the most frequent brute attacks come from. You can also manage the blacklisted IPs from your CleanTalk Dashboard-> “Use CleanTalk Database of Dangerous IP Addresses”. If you want to add an exception to your blacklisted IP addresses, you may add any IP to the whitelist IPs and it will not be blocked.

      Generic Tips and Tricks to keep your WordPress website safe:

      Other than using CleanTalk’s WordPress Security plugin and its advanced features, you can use these simple tricks to keep your WordPress website safe and secure all time:

      • Use email for login other than username. Usernames are easy to predict but hackers can’t easily guess any unique email ID. WordPress use unique email Id as login identifier for each user.
      • The default login URL for all the websites are similar. For example: wp-login.PHP, /wp-admin/ etc. You should change them to something your unique and own. This will prevent the hackers to get the admin logged in page’s URL or the dashboard URL.
      • Password of a WordPress site should consist capital letters, small letters, numeric and all type of symbols. Generally, an eight character password is considered as a strong password. Make it 16, it will be stronger and permutation and combination will be difficult.
      • Secure the WP-Admin directory from getting accessed by hackers.
      • SSL should be used to encrypt your sensitive data.
      • If your site has multiple admins, add them carefully after thorough scanning.
      • Admin username should not be kept as “Admin”.
      • Keep backup of your site regularly. You may buy professional services for backup and recovery routine.
      • Protect your wp-config.php file from hackers by keeping it one step higher than the root directory.
      • If you have multiple admin access, just do not allow the dashboard to be edited, by changing it in the wp-config.php file.
      • You should disable the directory listing using .htaccess.
      • Update your plugins and themes regularly.
      • Do not download or install any theme from an unknown site or provider. You do not know what is written in their code.
      • Plugins and WordPress itself should be updated regularly to get all the new security features.
      • Last but not the least, take precaution before installing any plugin. You should check the documentation, ratings, and reviews before installing them and that should be from a trusted source.

      Conclusion

      WordPress Security Plugin by CleanTalk is one of the best world-class security plugins for WordPress which facilitates your WordPress Website an end to end security solution and helps to grow your business without getting the headache of being attacked. CleanTalk’s Security Feature plugin is regularly updated with new features to cope with the new type of attacks and threats and to provide you smooth and flawless security services. Follow the tips and tricks and install a good security plugin will provide all round your WordPress website.

    • CleanTalk Anti-Spam Launches IPv6 Support for WordPress

      Hello!

      The latest version of WordPress CleanTalk Anti-Spam (5.77) just added support for IPv6 to protect for spam.

      This version that includes a number of improvements with the main one being the introduction of IPv6 support.

      Since IPv6 is becoming more and more popular there have been more requests for CleanTalk to include support for it, and it is now available, ensuring that your site is protected against IPv6-specific attacks.

      Also, we will add IPv6 support for every CleanTalk feature quite soon.

      Download the latest CleanTalk Anti-Spam for WordPress here.

      Don’t hesitate to let us know if you have any questions or comments.

    • CleanTalk Released an Extension for the Protection of OpenCart Against Spam and Spam Bots

      CleanTalk Released an Extension for the Protection of OpenCart Against Spam and Spam Bots

      CleanTalk completed the development extension for the OpenCart, to protect your online store against spam and spambots.

      The anti-spam extension is compatible with OpenCart versions v3.x. and approved on the OpenCart official marketplace.

      This extension allows users to quickly and easily connect to CleanTalk anti-spam service. Its service provides 100% protection from spam bots and provides a simple and convenient commentary/sign-up form for visitors.

      This extension allows protection from automatically distributed spam, as well as from spam bots registrations. The protection method offered by CleanTalk allows users to switch from the methods that trouble the communication (CAPTCHA, question-answer etc.) to a more convenient one.

      CleanTalk saves time and resources spent on moderation and verification of questionable users or comments. Unnoticeable Protection from spam and registration forms, which does not require the visitor to prove who they are, increases the conversion in registration and is not annoying.

      CleanTalk is a cloud service, security module, installed on a website, which sends the behavior parameters of the visitor or spambot. These parameters are estimated, and the service makes a decision – to post a message or to define it as spam and reject.

      On the basis of such checks, the service forms its own list of email addresses used by spambots. Likewise, the registration of visitors is checked. The service adds not only email addresses to the blacklist but also IP addresses and domains of the websites that are promoted through spam mailout. The CleanTalk company developed unique algorithms to assess the behavior of the visitor, and with 100% accuracy, we keep spam messages at bay. All of this happens automatically and requires no action from the administration of the website.

      You can now download CleanTalk Anti-Spam for OpenCart from the official catalog.

      The Company provides automatic spam protection services for popular CMS: WordPress, Joomla, phpBB, Drupal, DataLife Engine, IP Board, vBulletin, MediaWiki, SimpleMachinesForum and API for PHP, Perl, Python, NET.

    • CleanTalk becomes more convenient for mobile users

      Recently we have applied changes to our spam filters. They are about separation of users by their devices: desktops or mobile gadgets.

      Visitors more often surf through websites with smartphones and tablets, so it is necessary to separate them, besides spambots became to use mobile device parameters often as well.

      The changes made it better to detect mobile devices since their parameters of conduct and parameters of messages differ from desktop browsers. Moreover, human/spambot detection for sent messages from mobile devices was improved too.

    • CleanTalk Traffic Control — analyze web traffic in real-time

      CleanTalk Traffic Control — analyze web traffic in real-time

      We are happy to inform you about launching our new feature for the WordPress CleanTalk Security plugin.

      One of the most important component of Traffic Analysis is ability to monitor traffic in real time.

      Tracking of your website activity in real time. You can see how many visitors of your website or blog are online and what pages they are on, plus how much time they spent being there.

      Many tools only track traffic of visitors who enabled JavaScript in their browsers, thus they are not capable to show you the whole picture. CleanTalk Traffic Control will track every single visitor no matter if they are using JavaScript or not and provides many valuable traffic parameters such as:

       • Date and time of the visit to your website;
       • Spent time on your website;
       • IP-addresses;
       • Source country;
       • Browser;
       • Operational System;
       • Type of the visitor — Visitor, Search Bot, different bot, suspicious bot and so on;
       • A number of visited pages.

      Abilities:

       • Block specific IP-address, network or country directly from the interface.
       • Block IP-address automatically if the threshold of average quantity of visited pages was exceeded.

      This is great monitoring tool to see attacks in real time and to block them if necessary.

    • Checking Existing Comments and Users for Spam in Joomla CMS

      Checking Existing Comments and Users for Spam in Joomla CMS

      CleanTalk adds new features in CleanTalk Anti-Spam for Joomla. The work of the plugin is absolutely invisible for visitors and allows users to renounce forever the ways of protection complicating communication on the website (CAPTCHAs, questions, and answers, etc.). CleanTalk allows you to automate protection from spam and the registering of spam bots.

      We released a new version of the anti-spam plugin for Joomla, the new version has a function of automatic check for spam of the existing comments on the site.

      This allows administrators of the Web sites to automatically check and identify spam bots comments and registrations, which were not detected by conventional anti-spam tools.

      To start a scan, go to plugin settings: Extensions -> Plugin Manager -> Anti-spam by CleanTalk then click the button “Check spam users” or “Check Spam comments”.

      “The team CleanTalk has been developing a cloud spam protection system for five years and has created a truly reliable anti-spam service designed for you to guarantee your safety”.

    • AI will play an increasing role in online security

      AI will play an increasing role in online security

      Neural Networks were introduced as far back as the 40’s of the 20th century and first works about them started in the 50’s. Nowadays this technology is being used in different fields. We believe that the CleanTalk machine teaching technologies of spam detection could be upgraded with the help of Artificial Intelligence and the CleanTalk features could be expanded to define an emotional aspect of a comment.

      Theoretical researches of spam filtering with Neural Networks say that these algorithms could achieve 100% efficiency.

      The CleanTalk Company has started to develop Neural Networks Algorithms for spam presence analysis of comments and messages which could provoke negative effects, rudeness, abuse or fraud in discussions.

      There is a big data safety problem in online security. There are too much data to process anomalies that could be the signs of spambots presence.

      There are about 1.5 millions of requests the CleanTalk Cloud processes every day and each request contains set of about 40 parameters. The Cloud uses them to decide whether a request should be approved or blocked so AI could improve our possibilities in spambot patterns detection.

      We intend to supplement technology of spam protection and moderation with more reliable feature and take into account such things as slang, typos, context and other traits of a visitor behavior.

      About CleanTalk

      CleanTalk is a SaaS spam protection service for Web sites. CleanTalk uses protection methods which are invisible for site visitors. Connecting to the service eliminates needs for CAPTCHA, questions and answers and other methods of protection, complicating the exchange of information on the site. Their solutions are reliable, easy and efficient. The module is completely invisible to the visitors and allows you to permanently abandon the ways of protection that impede the communication of visitors to the site (CAPTCHA, question-answer, etc.). CleanTalk allows you to automate protection against distributed from spam and registration spam bots.

      The CleanTalk team has been developing a cloud spam protection system for 5 years and has created a truly reliable anti-spam service designed for you to ensure your safety.

    • Keeping Your Business Safe From Hackers in 2017 [INFOGRAPHIC]

      Resolute cyber hackers have many tools at their disposal to cause havoc in your systems while remaining undetected for a long period of time. More than a few high-profile companies have learned this the hard way. 2017 has been the year of high-profile cyber-attacks, with a growing list of victims that include the NSA hack, CIA’s Vault 7 data leak, Macron email hack, the Petya ransomware attack – the list goes on.

      It is fair to say that cyber-attacks are on the rise. Yet, it is interesting to find that many businesses openly admit that they lack sufficient defenses against such attacks, despite the damaging financial and reputational repercussions.

      Whether it is a denial of service attack, ransomware or email leak, investment in customer data protection and advanced early-detection systems is key for businesses.

      You may like to visit software directory to compare IT & security software after you have a look at the rundown we have compiled in the infographic below, outlining what you need to know about the looming cyber security threat businesses face.

      This infographic is based on ‘How to raise your organization’s security maturity level‘ by Bloor Senior Software Analyst, Fran Howarth. (Some data has been updated and new data has been included in the infographic.)

      Nabeel Khalid | Marketing Manager at CrozdeskBased in London with over 6 years of experience in Digital Media and Marketing, Nabeel is a regular contributor to the Crozdesk Blog.

    • It’s time to move websites to HTTPS

      It’s time to move websites to HTTPS

      CleanTalk has become a Comodo SSL Partner and we started to provide SSL Certificates.

      It is the best way to have your web services in one place to manage they.

      There are a number of reasons for the accelerated adoption of HTTPS

      -Improving SEO
      -SSL Provides Trust
      -SSL Provides Authentication
      -Protects your and your visitor’s information
      -Chrome browser will show your Domain URL as “Secure”

      So, if your website does not yet support the SSL technology it’s time to make the move.

      One of the most important factors in creating a successful online business is your clients’ trust. And one way to achieve it is providing your website safety using SSL certificate, which guarantees that all your clients’ data, logins, passwords and personal information will be transferred securely between your web server and browsers of the users.

      Also, Google announced that having SSL certificate is the most simple thing to do for webmasters to improve their SEO. It also said that they “can make a decision to amplify” signal as they want to «encourage all webmasters to switch HTTP to HTTPS increasing Internet security for everyone».

      Learn More about CleanTalk SSL