Website Security: Essential Features to look for in a Website hosting provider Introduction

By Inam Ullah Dar

In today’s digital age, having a robust online presence is very important. But more than that, ensuring your website’s security is crucial. Your website hosting provider is vital in safeguarding your online presence against threats.

There are some vital features of a website hosting provider. These elements should be prioritized when you select a hosting provider so that your website will be protected. This will ensure that it remains a trusted online destination.

Apart from the features, we will also talk about the factors that you need to consider when choosing a web hosting provider.

Why is Website Security So Important?

Before we discuss how you can secure your website, let’s talk about some compelling reasons as to why you need to pay attention to your website security.

Protects sensitive data, including customer information, financial details, and confidential business information.
Maintains website availability and prevents downtime caused by cyber-attacks.
Mitigates financial losses due to data theft, website downtime, and potential lawsuits.
Enhances customer trust and brand reputation.
Ensures compliance with data privacy regulations.
Protects against malware and ransom ware attacks.
Maintains search engine rankings by favoring websites with strong security measures.
Protects intellectual property, such as copyrighted content, trade secrets, and proprietary information.
Prevents spam and phishing attacks that can harm reputation and compromise user data.
Ensures peace of mind by knowing your website is protected from security threats.

Next, let’s discuss some essential security features of a website hosting provider.

Essential Features to look for in a Website Hosting Provider

Data Backups

Regular and automatic data backups are one of the most essential features of a website hosting provider. In case of any accidental loss or hacking of your website, you should not have to build your entire website again from the ground up. You can use your backup to restore an earlier version of your website.

Malware Detection and Removal

Malware is any software that can harm your website’s functions, performance, or security. It can seriously damage your existing data, even leading to completely deleting your entire website. Your host should include malware detection and removal tools. These tools will help find and delete all sorts of malware.

Preventing DDoS Attacks

Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks can significantly harm your website. They disturb your website’s functions and cause a lot of downtime for your website.

This downtime generates lost revenue and damages your brand image, leading to lesser traffic and fewer referrals. Thus, a good website hosting provider has appropriate DDoS protection measures.

Hardware Protection

Next up, your website hosting provider should have excellent hardware protection. This refers to the physical security of the data center where your website is hosted.

The physical servers should have good physical security for protection in case of an accident such as a fire or a natural disaster like an earthquake.

You should ensure that your provider’s data centers are not in a place prone to natural disasters such as hurricanes or tsunamis.

Network Monitoring

Hosting providers with an efficient and continuous network monitoring system are better than those without. Network monitoring helps guarantee a more secure website. Your website hosting provider can identify potential issues before they lead to more significant problems.

A reliable provider will have proper network monitoring tools, which will then help them recognize any unusual activities or patterns that may indicate a vulnerability or an attack. This will enable the hosting provider to take action as needed to reduce or eliminate the risk.

Restricting Access to Secure Information

User access to sensitive information should be limited. This includes physical and digital access. Web hosts must restrict access to the physical servers in their data centers. Apart from that, digital security must not be compromised as well. Hackers may be able to steal your data if digital security is ignored.

Two-factor authentication (2FA) is vital for controlling user access. For two-factor authentication, users must provide both a password and a temporary code sent either to their phone or their email.

Another essential feature of restricted access is a password policy. To protect their customers, website hosting providers can impose strict password policies. For example, they may mandate a minimum password length, number of special characters, and even a minimum number of capital letters.

Finally, role-based access control is also vital to controlling user access. Depending on a user’s specific job, the website owner can customize the user experience. For example, a content editor would only have access to the content editing interface, while a website administrator would have access to all of the site’s features.

SSL Certificates

Another essential feature of a good website hosting provider is Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificates. You should ensure that your provider provides SSL certificates either free or at a very affordable rate. They make sure that your sensitive data is encrypted during transmission. Suppose anyone tries to intercept your data during transmission. In that case, the data will appear to them as incomprehensible characters. SSL certificates also provide another layer of security for your website.

Firewalls

Firewalls are yet another integral part of your web security. Your hosting provider should guarantee access to proper firewalls that are easily configurable and integrated. Firewalls help protect your website and all its data against malware and malicious traffic.

Secure File Transfer Protocols

Your website hosting provider should also support Secure File Transfer Protocols (SFTP). This way, your data will be protected while uploading, managing, or sending your files. SFTP prevents unauthorized interception of your data. SFTP is recommended over regular FTP for better security.

Regular Software Updates

It is essential to ensure that your website hosting provider assures regular software updates. Regular software updates mean that your website will always have the latest software patches. Apart from that, your website will always have the latest monitoring network and the best security available.

It is also necessary to verify that any plugins and extensions you use are up-to-date, including your WooCommerce plugins and extensions. For example, if you are using the WooCommerce Product Video plugin, make sure that you update it regularly.

How to Choose a Secure Web Hosting Provider

When choosing a web hosting provider, it is important to consider the following factors:

The size and complexity of your website
The amount of traffic your website receives
Your budget
The security features offered by the provider
The reputation of the provider

Once you have considered these factors, you can start to narrow down your choices and choose a web hosting provider that is right for you.

Additional Tips for Website Security

Use strong passwords and change them regularly.
Keep your website software up to date.
Be careful about what plugins you install on your website.
Be aware of common security threats.
Have a plan for responding to security breaches.

Conclusion

For the best web security, these are some essential things to look out for. Your website hosting provider should provide data backups, malware detection and removal, prevention of DDoS attacks, hardware protection, network monitoring, restriction of access to secure information, SSL certificates, firewalls, SFTP, and regular software updates.

Finally, you can use plugins to add product-related videos to the product listings on your websites to guarantee better sales and increased revenue.

Inam Ullah Dar is a content writer by passion and profession. He started his journey with Motif Creatives. He primarily writes for guest post articles falling under various niches. The main area of his interest and expertise is Web design & Digital marketing. He enjoys reading and writing about healthcare, mindfulness, and well-being to educate people about being happier and lively. His work has been published on many high-authority websites. He believes that writing is an effective way to communicate at better levels.