Increase Your Dedicated Server Security with These Guidelines

Security breaches are increasing day by day and you can’t simply neglect the security of your data anymore. Unfortunately, cyber-crimes happen every day and websites of all sizes and scopes are targeted for personal benefits. If you have a website on a dedicated server, it is true that you are in a better condition in terms of security than many other types of hosting. Even then, there are some major steps that you should consider adding some extra security to your dedicated hosting server wherever it is possible.

1)- Execute a Strong Password Policy:

Whenever you purchase a dedicated server, it is crucial to change the passwords because most of the hosts set a password by default that increases the risk of cyber-attacks. Online businesses should always follow the below mentioned strategies to boost their password security.

1- Do not use any words or numbers related to your personal identity

2- Often use a combination of lower and upper case letters, symbols and characters.

3- Keep changing the password after some time.

2)- Keep Things Updated and Use a Trusted Network:

Make efforts to check the security updates on a regular basis and implement the patches wherever possible. It is better not to rely on any software to let you know the availability of the update. Be proactive and ensure that all the updates are installed as soon as they become available as this will highly reduce the chance of unauthorized access and attacks. Besides the updates, always make sure that you are using a trusted network. By this, we mean that avoid logging into your web hosting account from any public wireless network. This will help you reduce any unwanted attack on your dedicated servers.

3)- Protection from DoS Attack:

A Denial of Service attack often causes the server to fail and make it unavailable by making the system loaded with traffic. The attack takes place where there are multiple malicious computer working together to waste your server resources with traffic and cause issues for legitimate customers willing to gain access to the site.   DoS protection plan will provide an added layer of protection that will actually filter the traffic to ensure that all your visitors are legitimate. There are different protection options available against varying sizes that ranges from 10gbps to 100gbps.

4)- Take a Data Backup on a Regular Basis:

There may be chances of attacks even after taking all kinds of security precautions. With this in mind, it is very important to take a backup of your important data at least once a week, so that in case of any security attack on your dedicated server, you can easily restore your website to its previous state that you have saved. Off-site backups are also vital as usual backups. For this you need to consider a place that is physically secure, should be at a distance away from the original site and must be verifiable and accessible.

5)- Select a Firewall:

While hosting your website, choose the best dedicated server that has the best hardware and good system resources. Your hosting provider should also offer a quality firewall that helps to stop malicious data before it can reach your server.

6)- Consider a Managed Server:

If you find managing all these security responsibilities of your dedicated server a bit overwhelming, then one of the best things that you can do is to consider a managed server. With this you will have an administrator who can help you to handle critical aspects of protecting your server security. From installing the latest updates to taking backups on a regular basis, the administrator can help you save a lot of hassle and time.

7)- Scanning and Testing:

Since it is very easy to install any application on the dedicated servers, it also increases the risk of malware. Malware can copy any sensitive data from your server and can be easily bundled with legitimate applications and scripts. So, while choosing your dedicated server hosting provider, look for someone who offers ingoing vulnerability scanning and check your site for any type of unexpected behavior. It is also important to test the software on a secure platform and isolated device before it is uploaded on your server.

Summary:

“By taking some important steps, you can easily boost the security of your dedicated server. In case you are not following the guidelines or appropriate steps, then it is high time to implement them as a regular part of your everyday server maintenance task.”