Internet Hosting Know-How: Hosting A Website Begins Here
So, what are hosting services? People, when they say hosting services, mean internet hosting services. These are hosting service providers that run servers connected to the internet. They allow users to serve their content or services connected to the internet. Most internet hosting providers offer a combination of services. For example, these may include email hosting, website hosting, and database hosting.
When people research what hosting services are, they do it because they want a website. Website hosting services are among the most common types of internet hosting. What website hosting services do is that they host websites for clients. This is in contrast to, let’s say, file hosting services, email hosting services, game servers, or Wiki farms.
The focus of this article is website hosting. Meaning, we are going to discuss only that in detail here. The rest we’ll keep for future blogs.
What are website hosting services?
Website hosting services are internet hosting services that only host websites. They offer facilities to create, maintain, and make websites accessible over the internet. Firms that provide web hosting services are called web hosts. If you are looking to build a website for your business, you need a web host to get it live. Web hosts allow you to publish your website files onto the internet. Then, anyone with an internet connection can access your website.
What do website hosting services include?
Web hosting is of many kinds. They can be shared, clustered, managed, grid, cloud, or more. They all more or less include the following fundamental features:
- one or more servers (physical or virtual) to act as the host(s) for the sites;
- colocation for the server(s), providing physical space, electricity, and internet connectivity;
- a web server running on the host;
- Domain Name System configuration to define name(s) for the sites and point them to the hosting server(s);
- For each site hosted on the server:
Failures of Web Hosting: Meaning and Results
Not much is commonly understood by people when it comes to web hosting. Its meaning discussed, we can move on to graver topics. What is a web hosting service security breach? How does it impact the users of the web host and their business?
How does hosting a website become a security issue?
A web hosting security breach happens when it gets hacked. By hacked, we mean that a security hacker succeeds in breaking through the defenses of a computer system or network. They plan to exploit the system’s weaknesses for their gains or illegal aims most of the time. This could include getting access to data, money, information, control, services, or more.
What happens when a web host gets breached?
Frankly, a lot of losses. A web host’s security breach is not a small matter as it puts its clients and their customers at risk in a single go. At GoDaddy, the breach allowed the attacker to explore an enormous amount of data over two months, putting millions of people at risk.
Let’s look at some of these risks:
Access to sensitive information
A known result of a security breach is access to sensitive information. This includes personally identifiable information (PII) of customers on the databases of the breached sites. A breached web host allows the attacker to extract the contents of all the databases completely. This information includes account details of the businesses managed by the web host and their customers.
Exposed SFTP and database passwords
During an attack on a web host, its security gets breached. The potential impact of exposed SFTP and database passwords is much higher than common phishing threats. Access to these passwords allows the attacker to upload malware or add a malicious administrator. Then, the attacker can maintain persistent control over the site even if the SFTP and database passwords are changed.
Risk of phishing
Phishing involves sending false communications that look like they came from a trusted source. Most often, they involve emails. The aim is to steal confidential information. It can be credit card numbers and login information, or to infect the victim’s computer with malware.
The Godaddy Case Study: How Hosting A Website Wrong Leads To Security Breach
Hosting a website is a huge responsibility – even that can be an understatement when things go south. While looking for a web host, people have two things on their heads: speed and stability. This is understandable. Losing customers and sales because of a slow or down website is bad for business.
But, that is not all that goes into web hosting. Meaning, there is more to your website’s security. If your website is not secure, you and your customers are at great risk. You and your clients could face data loss, phishing, attacks, hacking, and more.
Something that happened at GoDaddy.
GoDaddy Inc. is a US-based publicly traded internet domain registrar and web hosting giant. It has more than 20 million customers and over 7,000 employees worldwide. In November 2021, a security breach affected up to 1.2 million of GoDaddy’s WordPress customers. It happened when an attacker got unauthorised access to the system used to provision GoDaddy’s Managed WordPress sites. This number does not include the customers of those websites affected by this breach. This includes those with many Managed WordPress sites on their accounts.
Mk-Way recommends EmpathyHost.com: The Solution To Your WP Managed Web Hosting Security Issues
If you have a great business idea, all you need is a great website to begin! And, it no longer matters how big your funds are. The online game has changed with new players, new rules, and new opportunities for everyone. And, new dangers as well.
Why MK-Way Chooses EmpathyHost?
Be it a blog website, a single-page personal portfolio, to a large eCommerce website, they all are at risk if your web hosting isn’t secure. If you do not think security is your priority, think again. With everyone on the internet, and billions of dollars flowing between them, the possibility of exploitation is at an all-time high. When you own a business, you have to protect it and your customers from possible identity or data thefts. EmpathyHost works with the same motto.
How? By focusing on the four key aspects of secure web hosting. Here they are:
Secure File Transfer Protocol (STFP)
SFTP (Secure File Transfer Protocol) is a secure version of FTP. It is used while uploading files to your hosting account. SFTP is an added layer of protection over the more vulnerable FTP.
Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)
An SSL certificate helps web browsers and servers communicate in an encrypted fashion. The SSL certificate is required for eCommerce websites. It protects the customers’ information such as credit card numbers, names, or addresses. An SSL certificate is essential for gathering personal, sensitive information.
Backing up your website
Backing up your site regularly ensures that your site is protected in the event of a problem or disaster. For a secure and successful web hosting experience, we provide the best and regular backing up options. At EmpathyHost, we also provide all the information about our backups. From how often we backup servers, what method we use, to where we store the backups.
Maintenance of the server
We ensure that your server is properly maintained to limit attacks. We also publish our security protocol to show our regular updates and patches.
In Conclusion: Secure Your Online Business With Empathy
EmpathyHost is a dedicated and secure website hosting service that provides you with two important things for your website’s security. First, we take care of our servers so that your website gets a secure environment. Second, we get you the necessary tools that you need to ensure that your website is secure. Third, we bring you an empathetic web host that knows how to address both your needs as well as your fears. We fortify your website against all attacks because we understand the responsibility.
At MK-Way, we offer you not just the best website maintenance and support, website audit, or technical SEO support. We offer you agnostic leadership with an empathetic support system. Contact us today.
