According to a recent article in the Washington Post, the average small business site has 44 hacking attempts per day, most of which are carried out autonomously by computer programs know as “bots.”

If web security is not at the top of your priority list because you aren’t storing financial or proprietary information on your site, it’s still imperative for you to know about the damaging consequences to your customers and your hard earned reputation that will occur if a hacker (or bot) gains access to or control of your site.  Here are just a few possible scenarios your organization could face.

1. Site Redirects: A user navigates to your site and then is immediately redirected elsewhere on the web.  We will never forget the time a small business owner contact us about helping them with their site.  We navigated to their site to evaluate the job and were redirected to an unsavory website.  We informed the owner who had no idea.  He was rightfully upset and worried about how much potential business he had lost because he neglected this aspect of his business.  Don’t wait until this happens to your business. We keep your site running smoothly and safely!

2. Black-Hat SEO: Search Engine Optimization is an incredible tool for both business and consumers.  But, as with anything, people have found ways to game the system.  Black-hat SEO techniques center around increasing traffic to the site by any means necessary.  It takes many different forms but one common practice is to hack someones’ site and add links in the sites web copy directing users to their site.  This is similar to a site redirect, except that your customers are more likely to trust a link that they believe you have added.  Again, this is an issue of reputation for your business.  Are you willing to let someone take advantage of your client base, or risk losing a client because of what is being promoted on your site?

3. Ransomware: Unfortunately the threat of ransomware has moved beyond just targeting computer hard drives.  Now website owners must worry about these viruses 1.  Jeopardizing any internal information stored on their website and 2. Spreading the virus to their clients who visit the infected site.  As new ransomware threats continue to arise, its extremely important to protect your investment and your customers.

4. Cryptocurrency Mining: Chances are that you have read the headlines of the exponential growth increase in value of some cryptocurrencies and while the subject is extremely complex, what you need to know as it relates to web security is that hackers are using websites’ computing power to “mine” cryptocurrency.  According to a recent Bloomberg.com article, in December of last year, “hackers targeted as many as 190,000 WordPress sites per hour to get them to produce Monero.”  Redirecting resources from your site will not only slow your sites performance, but also risks infecting customers navigating to your site.

We understand how overwhelming the threat of web security can be and we know just how busy  business owners are. CuratedWP was created to be an affordable resource for businesses to safeguard their online presences.  We are happy to bear your digital burden.

Contact us today to secure and maintain your online assets.