Frequently Asked Questions

Yes! WP Ghost provides powerful security features that allow you to hide the plugins and themes used on your website, making it more difficult for attackers to detect them.

How Does It Work?

The plugin assigns custom names and paths to your plugins and themes, effectively masking their real identities. This prevents hackers and automated bots from exploiting known vulnerabilities associated with specific plugins or themes.

Additional Security Enhancements

To further strengthen your website’s security, you can also hide common WordPress paths, reducing the risk of exposure. Simply follow these steps:

1. Go to WP Ghost > Change Paths > WP Core Security section.
2. Enable the Hide WordPress Common Paths option.
3. Click on the Save button to apply the security settings.

This ensures that key WordPress directories remain hidden from prying eyes, adding an extra layer of protection to your site.

For more details, check out:

• Hide WordPress Common Paths
• Change & Hide Plugin Names and Paths
• Change & Hide Theme Names and Paths

Using the same custom login path is not recommended when multiple security plugins are installed on your website. Each security plugin or theme that offers a custom login path feature should be configured with unique login paths to avoid conflicts and potential security risks.

Why Should You Avoid Using the Same Login Path?

When multiple security plugins or themes use the same login path, it can lead to:

• Style Conflicts: Plugins may apply different styles to the login page, breaking the design.
• Redirect Issues: Conflicting redirect rules may cause errors, making the login page inaccessible.
• Security Risks: Sharing the same path can unintentionally expose your login page, increasing vulnerability to brute force attacks.

Recommended Approach

• Set Unique Login Paths: Configure a different custom login path for each plugin.
  • WP Ghost: /customlogin
  • Another Plugin (e.g., Wordfence): /otherlogin
• Hide Default WordPress Login URLs:
  • In WP Ghost, enable the option to hide the default paths (/wp-login.php and /login).
  • This prevents bots and unauthorized users from accessing the default login page.
• Maintain Styled Login Pages:
  • Different paths allow you to retain custom styling offered by plugins like LoginPress without interference.
• Test for Compatibility:
  • After setting up the custom paths, test each login path to confirm there are no errors or conflicts.

Example Configuration

• WP Ghost:
  • Custom login path: /customlogin
  • Hide default paths: Enabled (/wp-login.php and /login)
• Wordfence or Other Plugin:
  • Custom login path: /otherlogin
  • Styled login page: Enabled

Outcome:

• Your login pages are both styled and secure without interfering with each other.
• Default login URLs are hidden, reducing the risk of brute force attacks.
• Plugins operate independently, ensuring stability and enhanced security.

Compatibility

WP Ghost is compatible with styled login plugins like LoginPress. If needed, you can configure both plugins to use the same custom login path without conflicts, but this approach works best for plugins explicitly designed to integrate with WP Ghost.

By following these steps, you can optimize security and functionality without compromising design or accessibility.

Installing security plugins in WordPress is essential to protecting your website from potential threats and vulnerabilities. Various security plugins for WordPress can help reinforce your website’s security measures. In this guide, we will explore the process of installing security plugins in WordPress.

To install security plugins in WordPress, follow these steps:

Log In to Your WordPress Dashboard

To install plugins, log in to your WordPress admin area using your admin credentials. You can access the dashboard by appending “/wp-admin” to your domain name (e.g., https://domain.com/wp-admin).

Navigate to The Add New Plugin Section

Once logged in, go to the Plugins > Add New Plugin tab on the left-hand side of the dashboard and click on it. This will take you to the Plugins page, where you can manage and install plugins.

Search For the Security Plugin

In the search bar on the Add Plugins page, enter the name of the security plugin you’ve selected or use relevant keywords. WordPress will display a list of plugins matching your search query.

Install and Activate the Plugin

Locate your desired security plugin from the search results and click the Install Now button. WordPress will automatically install the plugin onto your website.

Once the installation is complete, you’ll see an Activate button. Click on it to activate the plugin. Activation is necessary before configuring and using the plugin’s security features.

Configure the Plugin Settings

After activation, you can usually access the settings of your security plugin from the Plugins tab in your WordPress admin area. It’s vital to configure the plugin according to your preferences and requirements.

Each security plugin will have its configuration process, so it’s advisable to consult the plugin’s documentation or support resources for guidance.

Regularly Update the Plugin

Security plugins often release updates to incorporate new features and address potential vulnerabilities. It’s crucial to stay current with these updates by regularly checking for plugin updates.

You can do this by visiting the Plugins page in your WordPress dashboard, where you will see a notification if updates are available for any installed plugins.

Schedule Periodic Security Scans

To ensure continuous protection, configure your security plugin to perform regular security scans, including malware scanning and vulnerability checks. This process allows the plugin to detect and identify potential threats or weaknesses on your website.

Remember, installing security plugins is just one part of a comprehensive security strategy for your WordPress site. Additional security measures, such as strong passwords, two-factor authentication, regular backups, and secure hosting, should also be implemented to maximize your website’s security.

Since WordPress is the most popular content management system (CMS), its high popularity has also made it an attractive place for hackers and malicious actors.

As a WordPress website owner, you should prioritize hacking to secure the internet, protect your data, and protect your visitors. The question arises: do you need a security plugin for WordPress? Let’s explore the importance of having a dedicated security plugin.

A Dangerous Situation Looming

The internet is a place for cyberbullying, and WordPress websites are no exception. Cybercriminals often target WordPress sites with various attacks, such as brute force attacks, malware injections, DDoS attacks, etc.

These attacks can cause data breaches, website corruption, identity theft, and compromised user experiences. Implementing security plugins serves as an important defense mechanism against threats.

Strong Protection Against Exploitation

WordPress security plugins are designed to provide complete protection against vulnerabilities and common exposures (CVEs). These plugins offer real-time threat detection, malware scanning, and firewalls to detect and block malicious activity.

Security measures can be updated and enforced independently. Check the integrity of your website and your WordPress installation for potential vulnerabilities.

Use of Beautiful Materials

With a security plugin, you can access vulnerability management tools that detect outdated software, plugins, or themes. Outdated components can pose significant security risks, as attackers often exploit known vulnerabilities.

A security plugin can automatically scan your WordPress site for outdated software and plugins and provide timely updates or guidance for patching vulnerabilities.

Providing Protection from Brute Force Attacks

Brute force attacks involve multiple login attempts to gain unauthorized access to your WordPress admin panel.

The security plugin can apply access restrictions, allowing you to block login attempts and IP addresses associated with suspicious activities.

This greatly reduces the risk of successful brute-force attacks and helps keep your website secure.

User Account Security

User accounts on your WordPress website can also be vulnerable to attacks.

With a security plugin, you can enforce a strong password policy, implement two-factor authentication, or monitor user activity.

These features increase the security of user accounts and reduce the risk of unauthorized access to sensitive information.

The Peace of Mind

One of the main benefits of using a security plugin is that it gives you peace of mind.

Knowing that your WordPress website is tightly protected against potential threats can help you focus on creating valuable content, growing your business, or managing your online presence on other important issues.

Security plugins help reduce the risk of security breaches and ensure you are well-prepared to handle unexpected situations.

Now, Back To the Question

“Do I really need a security plugin for WordPress?” It said YES. The ever-changing threat landscape and the increasing prevalence of cyber-attacks necessitates the implementation of strong security measures.

The dedicated WordPress security plugin provides maximum security, protecting your site from malicious applications and cyber threats.

With a security plugin, you can protect your data, protect your visitors, and ensure your online presence is stable and long-lasting.

To block WP content using WP Ghost, you can change the wp-content path and then hide it using the option to Hide WordPress Common Paths.

This effectively obscures your WordPress site’s common directories, making it more difficult for automated bots and malicious users to identify and access your site’s content.

• Go to the WP Ghost > Change Paths > WP Core Security page in your WordPress dashboard.
• Change the default wp-content path to something unique and not easily guessable.
• Switch on the Hide WordPress Common Paths option. This will hide and secure the wp-content path and subpaths.
• Click the Save button to apply the changes.

Your wp-content directory, which contains themes, plugins, and uploads, is now secured from hacker bot attacks.

The process is user-friendly and is managed from within the plugin’s settings, providing a straightforward way to enhance the security of your WordPress installation.

The Hide My WP Ghost (short WP Ghost) is a comprehensive hack-prevention security solution for WordPress websites. It adds multiple layers of security to block hacker bots and prevent unauthorized access.

It works by changing and hiding common vulnerabilities, making it difficult for bots and hackers to exploit weak points in plugins, themes, and the WordPress core itself.

Read More: What is WP Ghost? and Customize Paths with WP Ghost

We’re excited to tell you about a fantastic solution for cloaking your WordPress site. Now, you might wonder, ‘What in the world is cloaking, and why do I need it for my WordPress site?’ Don’t worry; we’ve got you covered!

Cloaking, in the WordPress world, refers to the technique of hiding or disguising certain elements of your website to protect it from hackers and malicious bots. It’s like putting on an invisibility cloak on your website’s most vulnerable parts, ensuring that the bad guys can’t find and exploit them.

When choosing the best plugin for this job, we recommend the WP Ghost plugin. This plugin is an absolute game-changer and has been used on over 200,000 WordPress websites.

WP Ghost does an incredible job of hiding and securing your WordPress core paths and files, login and admin paths to enhance your site’s security. It also goes the extra mile by providing additional layers of protection, such as firewall security and Brute Force security, which prevents malicious scripts from harming your site.

So, if you’re looking for a reliable and efficient cloaking solution for your WordPress site, we really recommend WP Ghost enough. Give it a try, and take the first step towards a more secure and robust WordPress experience!”

Hiding the WordPress version is crucial in securing your website against hackers and theme detectors.

By default, WordPress adds metadata and version numbers to scripts, styles, and images, revealing the CMS version you are using. Attackers can use this information to target vulnerabilities specific to that version.

1. Go to WP Ghost > Tweaks > Hide Options.
2. Switch on the Hide Version from Images, CSS, and JS in WordPress option to hide all versions from the frontend’s CSS, JS, and Images.
3. Click the Save button to apply the changes.

By enabling this feature in WP Ghost, the plugin will hide all version information from images, CSS styles, and JavaScript files within your WordPress site.

This helps enhance security by preventing potential attackers from quickly identifying the WordPress version and any associated vulnerabilities.

Keep in mind that this feature works to hide version details as long as the WP Ghost plugin is active on your website.

To hide the theme name in WordPress, you can use the WP Ghost plugin.

Here’s how you can hide the the theme names:

1. First, you must install and activate the WP Ghost plugin on your WordPress website and activate the Safe Mode or Ghost Mode from WP Ghost > Change Paths > Level of Security.
2. Next, go to WP Ghost > Change Paths > Theme Security section.
3. Switch on the Hide Theme Names option to change all the theme names in frontend with random names.
4. Click the Save button to apply the changes.

With these steps, WP Ghost will hide the theme names from public view on your WordPress website. Obscuring information about the themes you are using can help improve your site’s security.

Keep in mind that this functionality will work as long as the WP Ghost plugin is active.

To hide your WordPress site from the public while you’re building it and ensure security, you can follow these steps:

Use Maintenance Mode Plugin

• Consider installing a maintenance mode or under-construction plugin from the WordPress plugin repository.
• Activate this plugin to display a placeholder page to visitors while you work on your site.
• This allows you to build and customize your website privately without revealing it to the public.

Enable Noindex in WordPress Setting

While you’re in the development phase, preventing search engines from indexing your site is a good practice.

• You can achieve this by going to your WordPress Dashboard at Settings > Reading.
• Check the box Discourage search engines from indexing this site to add noindex tag to all posts and pages.

This setting will add a “noindex” tag to your site, instructing search engines not to crawl and index your content.

Implement Security Measures

• While you’re working on your site, it’s essential to have security measures in place.
• Ensure you have a security plugin installed and configured properly.
• Keep WordPress, themes, and plugins up to date to patch any vulnerabilities.

Limit Access with IP Whitelisting

• Some security plugins allow you to restrict access to your website based on IP addresses.
• Consider whitelisting only your IP address (and your team’s if applicable) to ensure only authorized users can access the site.

Regular Backups

• Always maintain regular backups of your website.
• If anything goes wrong during development, you can quickly restore your site to a previous state.

By following these steps, you can build your WordPress website privately, ensure security while it’s in development, and prevent it from being indexed by search engines until you’re ready to make it public.

To set up Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) in WordPress using WP Ghost, you need to follow several steps that involve activating the feature and configuring 2FA for your user accounts.

Activate Two-Factor Authentication

• Go to WP Ghost > Overview > Features in your WordPress dashboard.
• Toggle the 2FA feature to “On” to enable it.
• Click Start Feature Setup to access the 2FA settings page.

Choose Your 2FA Method

Authenticator App (e.g., Google Authenticator):

• Go to WP Ghost > 2FA Login > Settings and activate 2FA Code.
• Use an authenticator app to scan the provided QR code. The app will generate a one-time code for each login attempt.
• Set up customization options, such as max failed attempts and ban duration.

Email Code:

• Alternatively, you can choose to receive a one-time code via email.
• Go to WP Ghost > 2FA Login > Settings, activate Email Code, and configure the email address for receiving codes.

For each user, click Add Two-Factor Authentication under their profile.

If using the authenticator app, scan the QR code or enter the text key into the app and enter the generated code to complete the setup. If using the email method, specify the email address to receive the 2FA code.

Testing

Log out and test the 2FA setup by logging in again. You’ll be prompted to enter the generated code (either from the app or email) to access the WordPress dashboard.

Read More: Two-Factor Authentication

IsItWP.com is a website that offers tools and resources related to WordPress. One of its features is detecting whether a website uses WordPress as its content management system (CMS). When IsItWP.com detects that a website is powered by WordPress, it applies caching to the results for up to 30 days.

Once IsItWP.com identifies a WordPress-powered website, it stores the information about the WordPress themes and plugins used on that site in its cache. This means that subsequent visits to the same website within the caching period will retrieve the information from the cache instead of rechecking the website.

You can test this functionality by providing a blank index page (without any content) instead of an actual website to demonstrate this functionality. IsItWP.com will still detect that it’s a WordPress CMS and apply caching to the results.

If you prefer to use theme detectors that check the website every time you run a check, you can try the following alternatives:

1. WPThemeDetector: This tool detects WordPress themes and plugins used on a website and performs a fresh check each time you use it.
2. WhatWPThemeIsThat: This online service enables you to identify WordPress themes and plugins. It also performs real-time checks and provides detailed information about the detected components.
3. WhatCMS: While WhatCMS can detect various CMS platforms, including WordPress, it doesn’t focus solely on WordPress themes and plugins. It performs website scanning to determine the underlying CMS and other relevant details.

These alternatives offer the advantage of checking the website every time you run a check, ensuring you receive the most up-to-date information about the themes and plugins used on a WordPress site.

Why Hide Your WordPress Site?

Hiding your WordPress site offers several benefits, including enhanced security, improved privacy, protection against targeted attacks, and the ability to safeguard your branding and competitive advantage.

Methods to Hide Your WordPress Site

1. Changing the Default Login URL: By modifying the default login URL, you can protect your site from unauthorized login attempts and brute-force attacks.
2. Hiding the WordPress Version: Displaying the WordPress version can make your site vulnerable to attacks targeting specific versions. You can hide the version number by modifying your theme’s files or using plugins designed for this purpose.
3. Obfuscating Theme and Plugin Names: Changing the default names of your themes and plugins makes it more challenging for potential attackers to identify vulnerabilities. Manual renaming or using dedicated plugins can help achieve this.
4. Protecting WP-Admin Directory: Securing the wp-admin directory adds an extra layer of protection. You can restrict access to this directory by configuring your server settings or using security plugins.
5. Disabling Directory Browsing: Preventing directory browsing ensures that visitors cannot see the contents of your directories, making it harder for attackers to identify potential vulnerabilities. You can do this by modifying your website’s .htaccess file or using plugins.

Absolutely! WP Ghost offers hack prevention security protection by allowing you to hide the plugins and themes you use on your website.

It achieves this by assigning custom names and paths and hiding them from hacker bots and spammers, making it difficult for potential attackers to identify them.

By navigating to WP Ghost > Change Paths > WP Core Security, you can activate the Hide WordPress Common Paths and Hide WordPress Common Files options, ensuring an extra layer of protection for your website’s core functionality.

Read more: Hide WordPress Common Paths and Files

Naturally, you may have concerns about the impact of using security plugins on your website’s loading speed. This article will address the common misconception surrounding the WP Ghost plugin and its effect on website performance.

The Need for Website Security

With the ever-increasing number of cybersecurity threats, securing your website has become essential. WP Ghost provides a robust solution by changing your website’s default paths and URLs, making it more challenging for hackers to exploit vulnerabilities. But does this security measure come at the expense of your website’s loading speed? Let’s find out.

The Truth About Website Loading Speed

Contrary to popular belief, using the WP Ghost plugin does not significantly impact your website’s loading speed. In fact, the changes made by the plugin are executed swiftly and efficiently. On average, the path changes occur in just 0.05 seconds, ensuring a seamless transition for your visitors.

Cache Plugin Compatibility

Many websites use cache plugins to enhance performance by storing static versions of their pages. The good news is that WP Ghost works harmoniously with cache plugins. The plugin’s path changes occur in the background without even loading on the front end, which means that your website’s visitors will not experience any delays or disruptions caused by the path changes.

Maximizing Speed with WP Ghost Tweaks

WP Ghost offers a range of built-in tweaks to further optimize your website’s loading speed. These tweaks can be activated in the plugin’s settings under WP Ghost > Tweaks > Hide Options. By enabling these tweaks, you can enhance your website’s speed and performance even more.

Remember, prioritizing website security doesn’t mean compromising on performance. You can do both with WP Ghost. So, fortify your website’s defenses and enjoy the peace of mind of knowing that your website is secure without sacrificing loading speed.

Yes, it is possible to remove the language switcher from the WordPress login screen using WP Ghost.

1. Go to WP Ghost > Change Paths > Login Security.
2. Switch on the Hide Language Switcher option to hide the language switch from the login page.
3. Click the Save button to apply the changes.

Once you’ve completed these steps, the Language Switcher will no longer be visible on your login screen, making the login page simpler and more streamlined.

Providing a seamless and personalized user experience is paramount for any successful website. With the new language switcher feature and the flexibility WP Ghost offers, you can cater to your diverse user base’s unique needs and preferences.

To disable XML-RPC with WP Ghost, follow these steps:

1. Login to Your WordPress Dashboard
2. Once logged in, go to the WP Ghost > Change Paths > API Security section.
3. Switch on the Disable XML-RPC access option to block the access to /xmlrpc.php path and prevent Brute Force attacks.
4. Click the Save button to apply the changes.

Disabling XML-RPC helps to prevent brute force attacks, pingback abuse, and other potential security vulnerabilities related to this protocol.

Are you looking to add an extra layer of protection to your WordPress site? Look no further than WP Ghost. This highly customizable plugin makes upgrading your site’s security easy in just minutes.

It’s compatible with other popular security solutions and provides an extra layer of security that others don’t offer for specific WordPress-related vulnerabilities.

With one click, users can pick from 2 pre-built security levels and automatically configure the plugin to achieve their desired level of protection.

WP Ghost helps protect your site against common attacks, such as script, SQL injection, and brute force, by hiding vulnerabilities without physically changing files or directories.

It works like an invisibility cloak, hiding your WordPress site from attackers.

The plugin also includes a security check feature that scans your entire site to indicate its current security level and uncover urgent threats that leave it exposed to various types of attacks.

In addition to its camouflage and security check features, WP Ghost also provides custom security options, including custom login and logout redirects based on user roles, URL mapping to create friendly URLs for your site, and brute force protection to prevent repeated login attempts from the same IP address.

With over 200,000 secured WordPress sites and over 140.000 bot hacks blocked, WP Ghost is a reliable choice for enhancing your site’s security.

Yes, the plugin works with WP Umbrella but their connection is still made through the login page.

You can setup a custom login path using WP Ghost but you need to set the following option:

1. Switched OFF the WP Ghost > Change Paths > Login Security > Hide “login” option .

2. Set the same REST API path on WP Ghost and WP Umbrella settings

3. Confirm the new paths and clear the cache on your website.

To remove the WP Ghost rewrite rules from the WordPress definition in .htaccess, simply:

1. Go to WP Ghost > Advanced > Compatibility.
2. Switch off the option Add Rewrites in WordPress Rules Section.
3. Click the Save button to apply the changes.

This will ensure WP Ghost adds the rewrite paths before the WordPress rewrite rules, without interfering with the # BEGIN WordPress and # END WordPress section.

Alternatively, you can add the following line to your wp-config.php file:

define( 'HMW_RULES_IN_WP_RULES', false );

This will prevent WP Ghost from adding its rules to the WordPress rewrite rules section.

Yes, WP Ghost has been tested and confirmed to work seamlessly with the BuddyBoss platform, ensuring website compatibility using BuddyBoss themes and plugins. This includes the social networking features, community tools, and membership functionalities that BuddyBoss offers.

However, it’s important to note that while we’ve tested WP Ghost with the BuddyBoss website framework, we have not specifically tested it with the BuddyBoss App. If you are using the BuddyBoss App or plan to integrate it, we highly recommend performing your own compatibility testing to ensure everything functions as expected.

One crucial aspect to keep in mind is the use of the REST API. BuddyBoss relies on the WordPress REST API for various features, especially for app-related functionality and integrations. Because of this, we strongly advise leaving the REST API path unchanged in WP Ghost settings. Disabling or restricting REST API access could interfere with remote connections, including those required by the BuddyBoss App.

We encourage you to visit our WP Ghost Compatibility Plugins List for additional details about WP Ghost’s compatibility with BuddyBoss and other plugins.

If you have any further questions or encounter specific issues with BuddyBoss or other integrations, feel free to contact our support team for assistance!

QUESTION: Let’s say an agency offers this premium plugin as part of its service. Will your team be able to directly support this agency’s clients with any technical issues or other queries?

Whether you choose to install WP Ghost on your personal sites or a client’s site, YOU will be our customer and you will get support from us as long as you have an active subscription – for all sites connected to your account.

However, we don’t provide direct support for your agency’s clients.

With the Whitelabel Option in WP Ghost, we also allow users to customize the link that is usually sent to our Knowledge Base (so that it doesn’t show our branding).

However, you can choose to leave that as is and provide access to our extended Knowledge Base as support to help your customers.

QUESTION: If I sell my website, does my WP Ghost licensing transfer to the new owner, or does the new owner have to buy their own license?

It is possible to change the email address associated with your account. Therefore, you can change it so that it would be the email address of the new owner, if you want.

However, we don’t have a license transfer system.

Yes, support is included as long as you have an active subscription.

However, note that we only provide direct support to you, our customer. But we don’t provide direct support to your agency’s clients, in case you install WP Ghost on clients’ sites, for example.

We prioritize offering premium support, and we do our best to respond to all support requests as soon as possible (you can typically expect to receive a response within 24-48 hours – during business days).

In case you bought a plan with limited websites, it’s important to know this:

The number of websites associated with a plan refers to active installs (the maximum number of sites on which you can use the plugin AT THE SAME TIME).

For example, if you get the Ghost 5 PLAN (5 websites), you can have WP Ghost installed on a maximum of 5 websites simultaneously.

However, if you later decide that you no longer need to use the plugin on one of those websites, you can remove that website from your account. This will free up space for a new website.

Want unlimited sites? Then be sure to check out the Ghost ALL plan for WP Ghost.

There won’t be any issues if, for any reason, you decide to stop using WP Ghost on your site.

All settings are reversible. When you Deactivate WP Ghost, all settings will revert, and when you delete the plugin, it will be as if it was never there in the first place.

Your site(s) will be returned to their exact state before WP Ghost was installed.

If Google has already indexed your new image paths and you want to avoid a 404 error when accessing the old image paths, follow this tutorial.

Question: Can I manage the plugin on my client’s website directly from the WP Ghost Dashboard?

You can manage this from your WP Ghost Dashboard and disable access to the Wp Ghost Cloud side.

You can block a site from the WP Ghost Dashboard > Connected Websites list. Search the client’s website for which you want to block/disconnect the license. This will block its access to the license, and you don’t need to log in to the client’s website to disconnect the website.

The plugin inside their WordPress will tell those customers they need to re-connect, and they won’t be able to use it.

Question: If we delete a website from the WP Ghost Dashboard, what happens to the installed website’s settings and configurations?

The client’s website and settings will not be affected to prevent any error that might appear after the website disconnects. The paths will be changed to default once the user accesses the plugin settings on the WordPress website.

The user must create a new account and add a valid activation token to configure the plugin again.

Read Also: Whitelabel in WP Ghost

No, WP Ghost doesn’t add any code to WordPress core files, and it will roll back everything when you deactivate the plugin.

The rewrite rules are added to the .htaccess file for Apache and will show you the rules you need to add on NGINX and Windows servers.

Clickjacking usually happens after your website is hacked.

WP Ghost was created as a hack-prevention plugin to protect your website and prevent script injection by hacker bots into vulnerable files.

To learn more about how WP Ghost helps you protect your WordPress site against hacker bots and spammers, check out What is WP Ghost?

WP Ghost is compatible with most Apache server types.

For NGINX servers, access to the Nginx config file needs to include the rewrite rules file from WP Ghost. So, in order to use WP Ghost, you need access to the Nginx config file and access to restart the service.

Or, you need to be able to contact the host to add the include path_to_file/hidemywp.conf file in Nginx and restart the service for you.

There is also the possibility to load WP Ghost Presets without any server configuration required.

Read More: Use WP Ghost with Nginx Hosting Without Editing Config Files

Currently, the plugin is completely translated to

• Arabic 
• Chinese
• Dutch 
• Finnish 
• French
• German
• Italian
• Spanish
• Japanese
• Portuguese – Brasil
• Portuguese – Portugal 
• Romanian
• Russian

Also, we have plans to translate the plugin in more languages, as you can see on our Roadmap here >>

We are always looking to our customers to help us prioritize, so if you have a language you’d like to see WP Ghost translated to, we’d love to get your input.

Yes, you can use WP Ghost with the AppMySite plugin.

By default, for both Safe Mode and Ghost Mode, WP Ghost will leave the default wp-json as the custom wp-json Path.

When using WP Ghost with the AppMySite plugin, do not change the REST API Path or disable the REST API access.

Read more: Change REST API Path with WP Ghost

QUESTION: Will WP Ghost help my WP sites against all bots? I have a problem with my sites reaching the allowed inode quota due to bots. Will this be a solution for this issue?

Once you change the common WordPress paths and hide them from bots, it will show a 404 error instead of loading the server resources.

WP Ghost also stops the automated comments and posting to the old wp-comments-post.php file to prevent comment spams.

You can use WP Ghost with other security plugins to boost your site’s security by enabling proactive protection and website integrity protection.

Yes, WP Ghost has 7G Firewall protection and you can activated for all server types.

7G Firewall is an advanced firewall supported by Jeff Starr: https://perishablepress.com/7g-firewall/

The 7G Firewall offers lightweight, server-level protection against various malicious requests, bad bots, automated attacks, spam, and many other types of threats and nonsense.

Note! 7G Firewall may not work with all server configurations. In case of functionality issues, select minimal or medium protection for more compatibility.

To activate 7G Firewall in WP Ghost follow this tutorial: 7G Firewall for WordPress

When activating either Safe Mode or Ghost Mode, you will be asked to perform a Frontend Test and a Login Test (this action allows you to check website functionality from a preview popup).

If you notice any issues while checking the login page, test the website with a different browser or from private mode. This way, you will double-check that you can log in to your website after the paths are changed.

Do not log out of your website before you finish the test. If you click on the No, Abort button on the Frontend Test panel, the plugin will load your website’s previous working paths.

When you confirm the Login Test by pressing the Yes, It’s Working button, the plugin will download a file with the new login path and the SAFE URL (it’s very important that you save the URL). The SAFE URL will also be available on the WP Ghost Dashboard > Connected Sites section.

This way, you will be able to access the safe URL and log in when there is a compatibility issue with other active plugins.

Also read: How to Disable WP Ghost In Case Of an Error.

Yes, to access the Disable Options in WP Ghost, Go to WP Ghost > Tweaks > Disable Options. You will find the Disable Inspect Element option.

By activating this option, WP Ghost will disable the key combination that shows the Inspect Element on your website.

To learn more about the Disable Options from WP Ghost access: Disable Right-Click and Keys

Based on our Privacy Policy, all Events Log data will be securely saved on our Cloud Servers for 30 days, and you can always export them directly from the cloud in Excel format.

What you see in the User Events Log (on the WP Ghost Dashboard) is the same as what you see in the WP Ghost > Events Log report section (inside the WP Ghost plugin). This ensures your logs are secure, temporary, and easily accessible when needed.

For more details on the Events Log feature, please refer to our comprehensive guide here.

Question: When linking to PDFs and other documents in wp-content/uploads, does the plugin rewrite links on the frontend automatically?

After changing the /wp-content/uploads path in Wp Ghost, the plugin will rewrite the paths to the PDFs in the frontend. The change will be made automatically, and all your website links will point to the new paths.

e.g. https://www.florinmuresan.com/storage/example.pdf

Where /storage is the custom /wp-content/uploads path name.

WP Ghost is designed to be compatible with WordPress migration plugins, provided you follow a few steps during the migration process:

Domain Name Changes

If you’re only changing the domain name in Settings > General, WP Ghost will automatically adjust because its settings rely on website paths, not the domain name. After making this change, simply clear the cache, and everything should function correctly.

Server or Full Website Migrations

Before migrating to a new server or duplicating the website, back up your WP Ghost settings and deactivate the plugin. This ensures all default paths remain accessible for the migration plugin.

After the migration, reactivate WP Ghost and restore your settings from the saved backup.

Run a Frontend Test from WP Ghost > Change Paths to verify that the new server does not require additional configuration.

By following these steps, you can ensure a seamless migration process while maintaining WP Ghost’s security benefits.

Yes, WP Ghost is designed to be as user-friendly as possible. You don’t need coding skills or advanced technical expertise to enhance your site’s security with this plugin.

With pre-built security levels, the plugin can be configured with just one click, making setup quick and straightforward. Many users have praised WP Ghost for being intuitive and easy to navigate.

While the plugin offers advanced features, we’ve included extensive support to ensure you can easily set it up and use it effectively. You’ll find helpful resources like articles, tutorials, and how-to guides directly within the plugin. Additionally, we’re continually adding more resources, including video tutorials, to assist users.

We’re committed to improving WP Ghost’s usability and value all feedback to make it even better.

Question: I already have Sucuri Security Pro. Is it still worth getting this plugin? Will there be conflicts & problems? Would this add to my Sucuri Security experience?

Yes, it’s worth getting WP Ghost even if you already have Sucuri Security Pro, as the two plugins provide complementary protection.

While Sucuri focuses on monitoring, detecting, and cleaning up after attacks such as malware, injections, or unauthorized changes, WP Ghost adds a proactive layer of defense by hiding vulnerabilities in your WordPress core, themes, and plugins. This makes it much harder for hackers and bots to identify potential targets on your site, preventing attacks before they happen.

Unlike traditional security plugins that react to threats, WP Ghost helps you avoid them altogether. Its unique approach works seamlessly alongside Sucuri, creating two distinct layers of security: one to prevent attacks and another to mitigate damage if an attack occurs.

Together, they significantly strengthen your site’s overall defense against hacking attempts and data loss.

For more details, visit WP Ghost and Sucuri Security.

WordPress security plugins offer essential features like malware scanning, firewall protection, and login security to secure websites from malicious activities. WP Ghost and WP Hide Security Enhancer are plugins that provide a robust defense against potential threats, ensuring the smooth operation of your website.

In such an environment, ensuring the security of your WordPress site is crucial.

However, installing all the security plugins available online is unnecessary. Instead, selecting the right combination of plugins can provide comprehensive protection without redundancy.

WP Ghost and WP Hide & Security Enhancer are two notable plugins in the WordPress security landscape.

That said, it’s important to mention that we don’t intend to replace the other security plugins out there. Our purpose is to add an extra layer of protection (that is not available in other plugins) to prevent hacking attempts.

Read More: WP Ghost and WP Hide Security Enhancer

Being the most popular CMS on the internet, WordPress is also the most hacked.

WP Ghost adds significant value to your security stack by proactively addressing vulnerabilities and complementing existing reactive security measures.

Here’s what it brings to the table:

Prevention-Oriented Defense

WP Ghost focuses on stopping attacks before they occur by:

• Hiding vulnerabilities in your WordPress core, themes, and plugins.
• Masking your site structure to prevent hackers and bots from identifying potential weaknesses.
• Reducing your site’s exposure to automated attacks by making it invisible to common exploitation tools.

Enhanced Layered Security

While other security plugins like firewalls or malware scanners react to threats during or after an attack, WP Ghost acts as a front-line shield. It adds a unique, proactive layer of security, preventing the most common hacking methods, such as:

• SQL injections
• Brute force attacks
• Plugin and theme vulnerability exploits

Improved Compatibility

WP Ghost is designed to work alongside existing security tools like Sucuri Security, Wordfence, or other solutions without conflict. This allows you to build a multi-layered defense system that:

• Prevents attacks from happening (WP Ghost)
• Detects and mitigates threats in real time (e.g., Sucuri, Wordfence)
• Cleans and restores your site if an attack succeeds.

Reduced Maintenance and Downtime

By preventing attacks before they occur, WP Ghost helps minimize the need for:

• Frequent cleanups of hacked files
• Malware removal
• Recovering from defacements or downtime caused by breaches

Additional Features

WP Ghost offers other benefits, such as:

• Hardening security configurations with ease.
• Ensuring compliance with best practices for WordPress security.
• Lightweight design to avoid slowing down your site.

By adding WP Ghost to your security stack, you gain a proactive, stealth-based defense mechanism that complements your existing tools, making your website far less appealing and accessible to attackers.

Based on a quick research WP Ghost is more complex in terms of the security features it offers.

Being the most popular CMS on the internet, WordPress is also the most hacked. WP Ghost helps you go undetected by hacker bots and prevents vulnerability exploitation.

Plus, WP Ghost allows you to monitor security level and uncover and fix security threats before they become a problem.

That said, it’s important to mention that our purpose is not to replace other security tools but to add an extra layer of protection (not available in the others), in order to prevent hacking attempts.

Instead of fixing files that were already infected, we focus on hiding the paths that hacker bots use to gain access or inject scripts.

Hackers and hacker bots can’t attack what they can’t find, which will automatically increase the level of protection of any WordPress site.

To complement WP Ghost, we recommend using a security plugin that focuses on monitoring, detection, and cleanup, such as one with a strong firewall, malware scanning, and real-time threat detection capabilities.

WP Ghost proactively prevents attacks by hiding vulnerabilities, while a monitoring-focused plugin can detect and respond to active threats, ensuring a well-rounded security stack. This combination provides both a defensive shield to stop hackers and tools to address issues if they arise, maximizing your website’s protection.

Using WP Ghost is a hack prevention method not a cure method. So we recommend using WP Ghost alongside other security plugins that focus on that for increased protection.

We have many clients using WP Ghost alongside tools such as:

• Solid Security – WP Ghost and Solid Security
• WP Cerber Security – WP Ghost and WP Cerber Security
• Sucuri Security – WP Ghost and Sucuri Security
• Wordfence – WP Ghost and Wordfence Security

Conclusion

If your hosting company offers file cleaners/malware removal, you may not need to pair WP Ghost with another security plugin. Otherwise, we recommend that you use it together with other security plugins.

WP Ghost will complement them by offering an extra layer of protection that the others don’t offer.

With WP Ghost you prevent hacking and attacks from happening, by hiding vulnerabilities in the WordPress core, plugins and themes.

Hackers and hacker bots can’t attack what they can’t find. With WP Ghost you can avoid getting injections in the first place.

This offers an extra layer of protection that you don’t get from other plugins and security tools. Those focus on helping you while you are attacked and after you are attacked by cleaning files, detecting malware, injections, etc.

With WP Ghost, you can access the Events Log Report, which includes events on your login page.

The plugin will track user login attempts and report on both successful and failed login attempts.

The also allows you to be notified via email when:

• An IP address was blocked by Brute Force Protection feature
• A user has unsuccessfully tried to login multiple times
• A user has logged in from different IP addresses

More details: Events Log Report

WP Ghost and Wordfence serve different purposes within the realm of WordPress security, making them complementary rather than competitive. Here’s how they compare and why using them together can enhance your website’s security:

WP Ghost vs. Wordfence

Primary Functionality

• WP Ghost: Focuses on prevention by hiding vulnerabilities in your WordPress core, themes, and plugins. It makes your site’s structure invisible to hackers and bots, preventing many attacks before they happen.
• Wordfence: Primarily a reactive tool that monitors your site, detects malware, and provides a firewall to block known malicious activity. It also offers login security and file repair after an attack.

Approach to Security

• WP Ghost: Proactive, aimed at stopping attacks before they even identify targets.
• Wordfence: Reactive and real-time, with a focus on detecting and mitigating active threats and cleaning up infections.

Resource Use

• WP Ghost: Lightweight, with minimal impact on server resources since it doesn’t rely on scanning or real-time monitoring.
• Wordfence: Resource-intensive due to its real-time scanning, firewall, and traffic monitoring capabilities.

Using WP Ghost and Wordfence Together

Yes, they can be used together effectively, as they address different aspects of website security:

• WP Ghost hides your site’s vulnerabilities, reducing exposure to threats.
• Wordfence monitors traffic and actively blocks malicious activity that might still reach your site.

By combining the two, you create a layered defense:

• WP Ghost prevents hackers and bots from finding vulnerabilities.
• Wordfence detects and responds to any attempts that bypass the initial preventive measures.

Together, these tools provide a robust, multi-layered security solution that significantly reduces your risk of a successful attack.

Read More: WP Ghost and Wordfence Security

Yes, WP Ghost can protect your site against spam signups with its reCAPTCHA integration for signup forms. Enabling this feature blocks spam bots from creating fake accounts, effectively reducing unwanted registrations.

This functionality complements WP Ghost’s primary focus on securing your site by hiding vulnerabilities. It ensures stronger protection against hacking attempts and targeted prevention of automated spam activities. This added defense layer can be highly effective for sites struggling with fake account creation.

For robust spam protection, you might consider combining WP Ghost with dedicated anti-spam solutions or features, such as Akismet, which offers form-specific anti-spam tools that can directly address spam signups.

In summary, while WP Ghost adds valuable security layers to your site, protecting against spam signups requires specific anti-spam measures in addition to WP Ghost’s features.

Read More: Brute Force Attack Protection

WP Ghost is highly customizable. You can turn settings and features OFF or ON based on your needs and preferences, which gives you a lot of control.

You can customize your security setup and quickly turn features on or off – directly from the Overview panel.

You can also further customize the settings for each individual feature. Be sure to check out some of the videos from the article below to get a better sense of just how much freedom WP Ghost gives you when it comes to customizing settings:

WP Ghost – YouTube

No, WP Ghost is designed to be lightweight and optimized for performance. It focuses on enhancing your site’s security without adding significant overhead. The plugin primarily works by hiding vulnerabilities in your WordPress core, themes, and plugins, which doesn’t require heavy resource usage or continuous monitoring.

Because WP Ghost doesn’t rely on real-time scanning or complex firewall rules like some other security plugins, its impact on site speed is minimal. It runs efficiently in the background, ensuring your site remains fast while benefiting from enhanced security.

In short, WP Ghost will not slow down your WordPress site and should actually help improve its overall security without compromising performance.

Even if you’ve implemented a 2FA (Two-Factor Authentication) plugin, WP Ghost provides a different layer of protection that complements and enhances your overall security strategy. Here’s why you should still use WP Ghost alongside your 2FA plugin:

Proactive Defense Against Vulnerabilities

WP Ghost goes beyond login security by proactively hiding vulnerabilities in your WordPress core, themes, and plugins. 2FA protects your login process, but if attackers can find weaknesses elsewhere on your site (like outdated themes or plugins), they may still exploit those. WP Ghost makes it harder for hackers and bots to identify potential targets.

Additional Layer of Security

While 2FA secures the login process by requiring a second factor, WP Ghost ensures that your site’s structure and sensitive areas are hidden from attackers. This reduces the likelihood of automated bots discovering and attempting attacks on your site.

Prevents Unauthorized Access Attempts

WP Ghost works alongside your 2FA to prevent unauthorized access before login attempts. It masks sensitive information to block bots and hackers from reaching login pages, reducing the risk of brute force attacks or other malicious activity targeting your site’s login process.

Note! If you’re already using a 2FA plugin, WP Ghost recommends deactivating other 2FA plugins and using WP Ghost’s built-in 2FA. This ensures no compatibility issues, and WP Ghost’s 2FA works seamlessly with its whitelist IP and firewall features, offering a streamlined, robust security solution.

WP Ghost does not include a CDN server as part of the plugin. To use the CDN Mapping feature, you will need to have your own CDN service provider.

WP Ghost allows you to map your content (like static files) to a CDN, but you’ll need to set up and configure a third-party CDN service, such as Cloudflare, StackPath, Bunny CDN, or another CDN provider.

Once you have your CDN set up, you can configure WP Ghost to integrate with it and map your content accordingly. This will improve your site’s loading speed and add an extra layer of security.

Read More: CDN URL Mapping

Using WP Ghost can increase your site speed in several ways by minimizing unnecessary resource loading and optimizing your site’s performance. Here’s how:

Hiding Unnecessary WordPress Libraries

WP Ghost includes features that disable specific WordPress libraries and scripts that are not required for most sites:

• Hide Emojicons: Prevents the Emojicons (emoji) library from loading, reducing unnecessary HTTP requests.
• Disable Embed Scripts: Disables external embed scripts, reducing page weight by preventing the loading of unnecessary third-party resources.
• Disabling WLW Library: Stops the Windows Live Writer (WLW) library from loading, further optimizing resource use.

These options reduce the number of resources WordPress tries to load, streamlining your site and improving load times.

Reduced Server Load

By hiding sensitive parts of your site (like wp-admin and login pages), WP Ghost helps reduce the server load from unnecessary bot traffic and brute-force login attempts. This allows your server to focus on serving legitimate requests, improving the site’s speed.

Blocking Unwanted Traffic

WP Ghost helps reduce unwanted traffic, including bot attacks and exploit attempts. By preventing these types of activities, server resources are freed up for actual users, resulting in a faster user experience.

Lightweight Plugin Design

WP Ghost is optimized to be lightweight, without requiring intensive server resources. Unlike many security plugins that run heavy scans or real-time monitoring, WP Ghost runs efficiently in the background, having minimal impact on your site’s performance.

By combining these features, WP Ghost significantly reduces unnecessary resource usage and improves your WordPress site’s load times, making it faster and more efficient for your users.

Yes, you can use WP Ghost alongside Solid Security (ex iThemes Security). Both plugins focus on different aspects of site protection, and when used together, they can create a more comprehensive security solution for your WordPress site.

• WP Ghost: Primarily focuses on preventing attacks by hiding vulnerabilities in your WordPress core, themes, and plugins. It also helps block unwanted bot traffic, hides the login areas, and optimizes performance by removing unnecessary resources.
• Solid Security: Provides additional protection such as firewall rules, malware scanning, brute-force attack prevention, and other hardening techniques to monitor and mitigate live threats on your site.

How They Work Together

Since WP Ghost focuses on proactive security by hiding vulnerabilities and Solid Security focuses more on active detection and real-time monitoring, using both will provide a layered security approach:

• WP Ghost will prevent many attacks from happening in the first place by obscuring sensitive areas of your site and reducing exposure to potential threats.
• Solid Security will provide ongoing monitoring, real-time alerts, and responsive protection if an attack occurs.

As long as the settings in both plugins are configured correctly, they should work well together without causing conflicts.

Read More: WP Ghost and Solid Security

WP Ghost and Solid WP Security (formerly iThemes Security) serve different purposes in WordPress site protection. While WP Ghost is an excellent tool for proactive security, it is not designed to replace the full range of features offered by Solid WP Security. Here’s a breakdown to help clarify:

WP Ghost

• Proactive Defense: WP Ghost focuses on hiding vulnerabilities by masking the WordPress core, themes, and plugins. This makes it harder for hackers and bots to find and exploit weaknesses.
• Login Protection: WP Ghost allows you to customize and hide your login page and implement 2FA, improving login security.
• Attack Prevention: It reduces exposure to malicious traffic by limiting what attackers can see or target.

Solid WP Security

• Comprehensive Site Hardening: Solid WP Security includes features like brute force protection, file integrity monitoring, database backups, and detection of outdated plugins/themes.
• Live Monitoring: Provides real-time security logs and alerts.
• Attack Mitigation: Uses firewalls and automated actions to respond to active threats.
• Additional Hardening: Offers a broader range of site hardening tools, like enforcing SSL and strong passwords.

Can WP Ghost Replace Solid WP Security?

WP Ghost can replace some of the basic features of Solid WP Security, such as login page customization and 2FA, but it doesn’t offer the same level of live monitoring, file scanning, or reactive threat management.

If you primarily need proactive protection (hiding vulnerabilities, stopping bots, and protecting login areas), WP Ghost might suffice. However, if your security needs include real-time monitoring, firewall protection, and post-attack recovery, Solid WP Security or a similar plugin may still be necessary.

Best Approach

For a layered security strategy, you can use WP Ghost alongside Solid WP Security, as they address different aspects of site protection. WP Ghost prevents attacks from happening, while Solid WP Security focuses on detection and mitigation if an attack occurs.

If you use WP Ghost on clients’ sites and have the WP Ghost White Label feature, your clients will not be required to add a token. This is because the White Label option ensures that the plugin automatically connects to your WP Ghost account, eliminating the need for your clients to manage or interact with any authentication steps.

This setup is particularly beneficial for agencies, developers, or freelancers managing multiple client websites. It not only streamlines the installation and configuration process but also provides a professional experience where the client sees a fully branded solution rather than any references to WP Ghost or tokens.

By using the White Label feature, you maintain control over the plugin’s settings and functionality while ensuring your clients receive the security benefits of WP Ghost without additional complexity.

WP Ghost doesn’t replace the sitemap created by the SEO Plugins.

With the Change Paths in Sitemap XML option active in WP Ghost, all the image paths will be changed to the new paths to hide the default paths in Sitemap. This helps the Search Engine index the new paths for your website.

If you activate the Remove Plugin Authors & Style from Sitemap XML option, any style that leads to the plugin author inside the sitemap will be removed.

This way, the sitemap will be clean for Google Search Console and other search engines.

Yes, you can use WP Ghost with Cloudflare, and the two tools can work together to provide enhanced security and performance for your WordPress site. Here’s how WP Ghost complements Cloudflare and what to consider when using them together:

How WP Ghost and Cloudflare Work Together

Cloudflare

• Acts as a Content Delivery Network (CDN) to speed up your site by caching static content and serving it from servers closest to the visitor.
• Provides a web application firewall (WAF) to block malicious traffic and prevent certain types of attacks like DDoS or SQL injection.
• Hides your site’s original IP address, adding an extra layer of anonymity.

Benefits of Using Both

• Comprehensive Security: Cloudflare protects your site from external attacks at the DNS and network level, while WP Ghost secures your WordPress application by hiding vulnerabilities.
• Performance Boost: WP Ghost’s CDN Mapping feature works seamlessly with Cloudflare to improve content delivery. Additionally, WP Ghost’s options to disable unnecessary WordPress libraries (e.g., Emojicons, embed scripts, WLW library) complement Cloudflare’s caching and optimization features.
• Reduced Server Load: WP Ghost prevents unnecessary bot traffic at the application level, while Cloudflare filters malicious requests at the network level, reducing strain on your server.

Conclusion

WP Ghost and Cloudflare can be used together effectively to boost both the security and performance of your WordPress site. By leveraging the strengths of both tools, you create a robust multi-layered security and optimization strategy that minimizes vulnerabilities and maximizes speed.

WP Ghost does not affect the accessibility of existing assets, such as images and PDFs, that Google may have already indexed. These files remain available through their default paths, ensuring that previously indexed URLs continue to function as expected.

Additionally, if you choose to use the Hide WordPress Common Paths option to enhance security, you can include MEDIA files in this setting. When enabled this option all old media file URLs will be automatically redirected to the new paths, ensuring continuity for both search engines and users.

This feature allows you to secure your site’s structure without disrupting existing assets or impacting your site’s SEO performance.

Using WP Ghost is unlikely to negatively impact your SEO or rankings if configured correctly. In fact, it can indirectly benefit your site’s performance and rankings by improving speed and security, which are key SEO factors. Here’s a detailed breakdown:

Protects Against Negative SEO

WP Ghost enhances your site’s security by hiding vulnerabilities in your WordPress core, themes, and plugins. This reduces the likelihood of hacks or malware injections, which can damage your site’s reputation and SEO rankings. A secure website builds trust with search engines.

Improves Site Speed

WP Ghost offers features such as disabling unnecessary WordPress libraries (e.g., Emojicons, embed scripts, and WLW library) and supporting CDN mapping. These features optimize your site’s performance, and faster load times contribute to better user experience and higher rankings.

Preserves Existing Indexed URLs

WP Ghost does not affect the accessibility of existing media files, such as images or PDFs, which Google may have already indexed. These files remain accessible through their default paths.

If you enable the Hide WordPress Common Paths option and include media files, WP Ghost will automatically redirect old URLs to the new paths. This ensures search engines and users are seamlessly redirected without encountering errors.

Maintains Crawlability

WP Ghost allows you to exclude critical paths from being hidden or blocked, ensuring search engine crawlers can still index and understand your site’s content structure. Proper configuration prevents any accidental restrictions on bots.

Conclusion

WP Ghost, when configured properly, will not negatively impact your SEO or rankings. Instead, it can enhance your site’s overall performance and security, indirectly contributing to improved search engine rankings.

WP Ghost provides excellent protection against spammer bots through its Brute Force protection and reCAPTCHA features on the Login Form, Signup Form, Lost Password Form, and Comments Form. However, it does not directly integrate with contact forms to prevent contact spam messages.

For contact forms, WP Ghost can indirectly help reduce spam by:

Blocking Bots and Malicious Traffic

WP Ghost’s 8G firewall and bot-blocking features can prevent many spambots from reaching your site, reducing the risk of spam submissions.

Strengthening Website Security

By hiding vulnerable WordPress paths and blocking suspicious IPs with the Blacklist feature, WP Ghost makes it harder for attackers to exploit vulnerabilities, which can sometimes lead to spam-related issues.

For direct spam prevention on contact forms, you should use features provided by your form plugin or dedicated anti-spam tools:

• Enable reCAPTCHA (most contact form plugins, like Contact Form 7, WPForms, and Gravity Forms, support it).
• Use an anti-spam plugin like Akismet or Antispam Bee.
• Implement honeypot fields to trick spambots.

Let me know if you have further questions or need assistance setting up these features alongside WP Ghost!

Yes, WP Ghost is still valuable even if you already have server-side protection. While server-side security (like firewalls, malware scanners, or DDoS protection) is critical, WP Ghost enhances your WordPress site’s protection in ways that server-side tools typically don’t cover.

Why WP Ghost Complements Server-Side Protection

Hides WordPress Footprints

WP Ghost hides sensitive WordPress paths (e.g., /wp-admin, /wp-login) and prevents attackers from identifying your site as WordPress, reducing targeted attacks.

Brute Force Protection

WP Ghost adds an extra layer of protection with reCAPTCHA options for login, signup, lost password, and comment forms, blocking spammer bots before they reach server-side defenses.

Firewall Rules for WordPress-Specific Attacks

It has specialized rules to block attacks that exploit WordPress vulnerabilities, like SQL injections or malicious file uploads.

Two-Factor Authentication (2FA)

WP Ghost offers built-in 2FA for WordPress accounts, ensuring strong login security at the application level.

Customized Blocking

Features like IP whitelisting and country blocking give you more granular control than server-side tools often allow.

Performance Optimization

By disabling unnecessary scripts (e.g., emojis, embeds) and libraries, WP Ghost improves site speed and reduces attack vectors.

Activity Logs and Reports

WP Ghost provides actionable insights into security incidents specific to WordPress.

Server-Side and WP Ghost Together

While server-side tools act as the first line of defense, WP Ghost strengthens your WordPress site’s application-level security, offering hack prevention solutions and protection that address vulnerabilities specific to WordPress.

Let me know if you’d like recommendations on combining WP Ghost with your existing server-side security for optimal protection!

Yes, WP Ghost can absolutely be used as a stand-alone security plugin for your WordPress site. It offers a robust set of features that cover a wide range of security needs.

Here are some of the key areas WP Ghost addresses:

Stand-Alone Security Features

• Path Security: WP Ghost changes and hides critical paths (like common paths, plugin paths, theme paths, login), hiding them from bots looking to exploit known WordPress entry points.
• 8G Firewall Protection: This firewall blocks harmful traffic before it reaches your site, filtering out malicious IPs, bad bots, and common threats.
• Header Security: WP Ghost enforces secure headers to prevent various types of attacks, including clickjacking and cross-site scripting.
• Anti-Spam Blocking: WP Ghost filters and blocks bad bots, minimizing spam and preventing bots from crawling your site unnecessarily. This feature saves bandwidth and reduces server load, improving your site’s performance.
• Brute Force Protection: By limiting login attempts and blocking suspicious IPs, WP Ghost helps to prevent brute-force attacks, enhancing login security.
• Two-Factor Authentication (2FA): Adds an extra layer of verification to prevent unauthorized access, even if passwords are compromised.
• Country Blocking: Allows you to block access from specific countries, minimizing exposure to known high-risk locations.

When WP Ghost is Stand-Alone

• Small to Medium Sites: WP Ghost is a solid option for protecting sites without needing additional security plugins. It covers the most common attack vectors.
• User-Friendly Security: If you prefer a single plugin for security rather than multiple layers of different plugins, WP Ghost is an excellent stand-alone option.

Considerations for Complementing WP Ghost

• Malware Scanning: WP Ghost doesn’t include deep malware scanning, so you may want to pair it with a tool like Wordfence or Sucuri for malware detection.
• Advanced DDoS Protection: For high-traffic sites or those facing targeted DDoS attacks, you may want to implement additional server-side protections, such as using Cloudflare.

Overall, WP Ghost is capable of functioning as a stand-alone security solution for many WordPress websites.

By activating the Events Log feature in WP Ghost, you will be able to monitor hack attempts and user activities like:

• See if someone is trying to hack your site through the login page.
• Know when a post was deleted, and who deleted it.
• Know when a plugin was activated/deactivated, and who did it.
• Track your freelancers’ or hired developer’s activities.
• Track your multiple blog authors’ activities.
• Track who has logged in, when, and with what IP address.
• View successful and failed login attempts. Track which IP address is targeting your login page.
• Track which themes, plugins, and core files are updated by which user.

All this data will show in the Events Log Report, which can be accessed at WP Ghost > Log Events > Events Log Report. It can be set according to user roles.

Yes, ALL settings are reversible.

If you Deactivate the plugin first (instead of deleting via FTP), then ALL settings will revert (everything will go back to how things were), and when you delete the plugin, it will be like it was never there in the first place.

Kinda like a Ghost. 🙂

Read More: Preventing 404 Errors After Deactivating WP Ghost

WP Ghost is NOT meant to replace the other security plugins out there.

Even if you’re using a security tool or plugin, WP Ghost can still be a valuable addition to your WordPress security setup. It focuses specifically on WordPress-related vulnerabilities and offers unique features that may not be covered by other tools.

WP Ghost specializes in protecting key WordPress entry points, like login paths and default WordPress paths, through features like Path Security and Brute Force Protection. It also enhances login security with reCAPTCHA and Two-Factor Authentication (2FA), which adds an extra layer of protection. Additionally, its 8G Firewall Protection blocks harmful traffic and bad bots before they reach your site, which can complement the protection offered by other firewalls.

The Anti-Spam Blocking feature is useful for filtering out bots and minimizing spam, improving site performance. WP Ghost also provides Header Security to prevent clickjacking and cross-site scripting (XSS) attacks, which might not be included in other security plugins.

Lastly, WP Ghost’s Country Blocking feature allows you to restrict access from high-risk regions, adding another layer of control. While it doesn’t include malware scanning, WP Ghost works well with plugins that focus on that aspect, like Wordfence or Sucuri.

Overall, WP Ghost can complement your existing security solution by offering specialized protections for WordPress, and it’s lightweight enough to enhance your security without overwhelming your setup. Let me know if you’d like help integrating it with your current tools.

Deactivate All Plugins

You can deactivate all plugins using FTP access or File Manager.

1. Rename /wp-content/plugins to /wp-content/plugins_temp
2. Create the folder /wp-content/plugins

This way you will deactivate all the plugins without deleting them one by one from WordPress.

If you rename the folder /wp-content/plugins_temp back to /wp-content/plugins, all the plugins will be activated again.

Note! During this process, do not access the Plugins tab in WordPress to avoid detecting that the plugins are missing and deactivating them all.

Test Only One Plugin

If you want to test only a plugin, copy the plugin folder from /wp-content/plugins_temp in /wp-content/plugins folder after creating it.

1. Rename /wp-content/plugins to /wp-content/plugins_temp
2. Create the folder /wp-content/plugins
3. Copy one plugin folder like /wp-content/plugins_temp/hide-my-wp to /wp-content/plugins/hide-my-wp

Now, after the test, remove the created folder and rename the temp folder back.

This is a really good question a website owner should ask.

I will try to explain as simply as possible how some of the attacks happen and what the best way to protect against them is.

A human hacker loads software with tons of actions and URLs designed to find breaches on a specific CMS. From URL to URL on the Internet, the software (bot) loads all the actions and URLs without checking the website CMS first. Once the bot gets a signal that a breach was found, it will automatically inject the script/worm, and the rest … well … is not bright.

As most of the attacks are made by bots and not by human hackers, there can be thousands of calls per minute for each website and the owner does’t even know about it.

Type of Actions and URLs

Find the list of attacks here: Hacker Bots Attack Types

Hide WordPress For Security

Here, you can find how to protect your website using WP Ghost: Protect My WordPress Website.

If you want to use WP Ghost for security rather than just to hide your website from theme detectors, you don’t need to change the plugin’s classes in the source code.

The best way is to change the WordPress CMS paths using the WP Ghost > Change Paths and hide the old WordPress common paths from bots so that the attacks will be rejected. This way, you don’t need to worry if a plugin is 100% secure, and you can concentrate on growing your business.

The good news about Hide My WP is that the plugin works well with other security plugins, such as Wordfence, iThemes Security, Shield Security, and more, which come to block more types of attacks and monitor all files’ integrity.

Hide WordPress For Themes Detectors

As we explained in other articles, hiding the website from theme and CMS detectors will not make your website safer.

If applicable, hide from CMS and theme detectors if you don’t want your visitors to know that you have a WordPress website or if you don’t want your website associated with WordPress for your company image.

Hide Your Site From Theme Detectors and Hackers Bots

Hiding your WordPress login page is a great way to secure your site from targeted hacks and automated brute-force attacks.

Why should you care about hiding the login page?

The answer is: Brute-force attacks.

In a brute-force attack, hackers try to guess your username and password repeatedly until it breaks in.

They hope to find the magic combination with enough tries. Now, I think you’re seeing where hiding the login page comes into it. If you hide your login page, hackers will have nowhere to run their brute-force attack.

Protecting the login path from your website is really important. The WP Ghost plugin is a quick and simple way to do that.

Once you install it, you can customize the wp-login and hide the /wp-login and /wp-login.php path from your website.

Read More: Change and Hide wp-login Path with WP Ghost

This plugin also protects your login page from Brute Force attacks if you have the login option for your members on your page.

You can use Math Check protection or reCaptcha protection from Google. Both protections are fine and will block the hackers to a limited attempts of login.

Read More: Brute Force Attack Protection

Hiding the WordPress site and CMS is a good idea when you want to protect your website from hacker bots attacks.

Usually, bots try to inject scripts and SQL queries into websites, whether they are WordPress or another type of CMS. Most of the attacks target well-known plugins with vulnerabilities that allow access to the WordPress core.

There are 2 ways to hide a WordPress site:

Manually through File Manager with a bit of PHP knowledge

To hide the WordPress Site you need to:

• Hide all the WP headers like RDS, DNS Prefetch, Generator Meta.
• Hide all the WP comments and versions at the end of each file.
• Change and hide the WP common paths like wp-content, wp-includes, plugins, themes and cache directories.
• Hide the files readme.html, xmlrpc.php, install.php, wp-config.php and more.
• Hide classes from source code beginning with “wp-” (make sure the plugins are not using them).

Use a free WordPress plugin

A faster way to hide the WordPress site without coding is to install the WP Ghost plugin.

Read More: Install WP Ghost Lite Plugin

Yes, you can hide the website until it’s ready for production in two ways:

1. The easy way to hide your WordPress website while you’re in development is to check the option “Discourage search engines from indexing this site” from Settings > Reading

2. Another way is to install a free maintenance plugin like https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-maintenance-mode/

The plugin will let you customize the website, but it will be hidden for visitors and search engines.

One advantage of using the maintenance plugin is that you can collect emails until you finish the website and have users for email marketing when you start your business.

It is not easy to hide the CMS from Theme detectors. You need to change all WordPress common paths in the source code, change the paths and links to the WordPress CMS, restrict access to WordPress common paths and files, and more.

If you have a WordPress site and you want to hide the fact that you’re using a WordPress CMS, install the WP Ghost plugin and configure it to hide and protect your website at the same time.

Read More: Hide Your Site From Theme Detectors and Hackers Bots

To prevent theme detectors from identifying your WordPress theme and plugins, you need to take steps to obscure WordPress-specific data and paths. This includes hiding or changing paths to themes and plugins, removing WordPress version information, and blocking metadata that these detectors rely on.

WP Ghost offers a comprehensive solution for this, with features like Path Security, Header Security, and the ability to disable WordPress enumeration, all of which can effectively hide your site’s details from detection tools.

For a step-by-step guide on how to protect your site and hide it from theme and plugin detectors, check out the detailed instructions in the WP Ghost Knowledge Base:

How to Hide from WordPress Theme Detectors

All the ajax calls in the frontend are made by the default URL /wp-admin/admin-ajax.php. This URL is also used by hackers to upload viruses and scripts on your website.

Changing the wp-admin/admin-ajax.php URL is mandatory for protecting the WordPress site from hackers.

To easily change the admin-ajax.php path, use the WP Ghost plugin. After adding a new Ajax URL, the default admin-ajax.php URL will be hidden from hackers.

How to Change admin-ajax in WordPress

1. To change the admin-ajax.php path, go to WP Ghost > Change Paths > Ajax Security section.
2. Switch on the Hide wp-admin from ajax URL option to hide the wp-admin path from Ajax calls.

Read More: Change admin-ajax.php Path with WP Ghost

You can change wp-content folder manually or using the WP Ghost plugin.

1. You can manually change the folder wp-content into lib (or any other name) using the File Manager on your server panel or FTP client. After the change, you will need to re-login to your website.
2. Use the WP Ghost plugin to change the wp-content path into lib (or any other name) and hide all the WordPress common paths to protect your website from hackers. No files or directories are physically altered.

Read More: Change wp-content Path with WP Ghost

The WordPress wp-login, wp-login.php, and login paths are the first ones a hacker bot will access for Brute Force attacks. Changing and hiding these paths is mandatory when you have a WordPress CMS.

To do this with WP Ghost, change the name for the wp-login with your custom name in WP Ghost > Change Paths > Login Security > Custom Login Path.

Note! No files or directories are physically altered. All changes are implemented through server rewrite rules, ensuring no impact on SEO or loading speed.

Read More: Change and Hide wp-login Path with WP Ghost

The most important path in WordPress is wp-admin, and the only way to protect it is by changing its name and hiding it from hacker bots.

To do this with WP Ghost, change the name for the wp-admin with your custom name in 
WP Ghost > Change Paths > Admin Security > Custom Admin Path.

Note! No files or directories are physically altered. All changes are implemented through server rewrite rules, ensuring no impact on SEO or loading speed.

Read More: Change and Hide wp-admin Path with WP Ghost

Yes, you can customize and hide wp-admin path on Nginx server. Just follow the setup instruction.

Read More: Setup WP Ghost on Nginx Server or Setup WP Ghost on Nginx Web Server With Virtual Private Server

Note! To change and hide the wp-admin path on Nginx Servers you need to have shell access to be able to reload the Nginx server.

Make sure you follow the setup instructions:

Hide Your Site From Theme Detectors and Hackers Bots

You can then use external WordPress detectors to verify if you are 100% hidden:

• https://hidemywpghost.com/#security_check
• https://www.wpthemedetector.com/
• https://whatwpthemeisthat.com/
• https://whatcms.org/
• https://mycodelesswebsite.com/

If the WordPress Detectors still find your website, please contact us, and we will check if there are some theme incompatibilities.

By default, the wp-admin path is visible for all logged users.

However, WP Ghost gives you the option to only show the wp-admin path for site administrators.

Switch on WP Ghost > Change Paths > Admin Security > Hide “wp-admin” from Non-Admin Users. Logged site users will only be able to access the wp-admin path if they are website administrators.

Note! Having the wp-admin path visible when you’re logged as administrator will prevent your website from crashing if you deactivate the plugin or if another plugin uses the old admin path in the backend.

Having the common paths hidden with WP Ghost will protect your site against hacker attacks.

XML-RPC on WordPress is actually an API or application program interface. It allows developers who make mobile apps, desktop apps, and other services to talk to your WordPress site. The XML-RPC API that WordPress provides allows developers to write applications (for you) that can do many of the things that you can do when logged into WordPress via the web interface.

These include:

• Publish a post
• Edit a post
• Delete a post.
• Upload a new file (e.g. an image for a post)
• Get a list of comments
• Edit comments

This page on the WordPress codex provides a complete list of the WordPress API functions available to developers via XML-RPC. XML-RPC WordPress API « WordPress Codex

If you disable the XML-RPC service on WordPress, any application can no longer use this API to talk to WordPress.

Let’s use an example to illustrate: You have an iPhone app that lets you moderate WordPress comments. Someone advises you to disable XML-RPC. Your iPhone app suddenly stops working because it can no longer communicate with your website using the API you just disabled.

There are two common attacks on XML-RPC:

• DDoS via XML-RPC pingbacks.
• Brute force attacks via XML-RPC.

If you still want to disable XML-RPC, use the WP Ghost plugin to disable the option and whitelist the app IP addresses so you can safely use the XML-RPC calls.

WP Ghost uses path rewrite rules to let you customize the old paths without physically changing them.

It also allows you to disable access to the old paths for hackers and protect the WordPress plugins and themes.

All these changes will not affect the WordPress directory structure through FTP and it will not break it when you deactivate the WP Ghost plugin.

It looks like a simple plugin but it’s a complex system behind it and a good firewall against Script Injection and Brute Force attacks.

WP Ghost is compatible with the most popular plugins. We are continuously working on this to further extend the list of plugins that WP Ghost is compatible with.

We’ve tested WP Ghost with over 1,000 plugins and themes so far, and we’ll keep at it, but if you DON’T see a plugin you may be using on our list here just yet, it doesn’t mean WP Ghost won’t work with it or cause issues.

The WP Ghost team periodically tests compatibility with cache plugins such as W3 Total Cache, WP Super Cache, WP Fastest Cache, Cache Enabler, CDN Enabler, Autoptimize, Jetpack by WordPress, LiteSpeed Cache, Cache-Control, Comet Cache, Power Cache, Hummingbird Cache, Breeze Cache, Hyper Cache, Bunny CDN, JCH Optimize 3, SWIS Performance, WP Speed of Light, SiteGround Optimize, NitroPack, and Rabbit Loader Cache.

The list of compatible Cache plugins: WP Ghost Compatibility Plugins List

If you use a cache plugin that is not in this list and you notice any compatibility issue, please contact us and we will work to make WP Ghost compatible with it.

Yes, the WP Ghost plugin is compatible with BuddyBoss Theme.

Read More: WP Ghost Compatibility Plugins List

Yes, the WP Ghost plugin is compatible with Jupiter Theme from Themeforest.

Read More: WP Ghost Compatibility Plugins List

Once you change the wp-admin path and switch on the WP Ghost > Change Paths > Admin Security Hide the New Admin Path option, you can’t access the new admin URL as a visitor (if you are not logged in to your website).

You need to go to the new login path. After you log in, you will be redirected to your WordPress dashboard on the new admin path.

Read More: Change and Hide wp-admin Path

To change the 404 error message when accessing the New Admin Path, switch off the Hide the New Admin Path option.

Also, you can change the error with Front Page redirect from WP Ghost > Tweaks > Redirects.

Read More: Redirect Hidden Paths

Yes, WP Ghost plugin is compatible with Classiera Theme from Themeforest.

Read More: WP Ghost Compatibility Themes List

If the .htaccess file is not writable, in order for WP Ghost to work you need to write the code you receive in the WP Ghost > Change Paths after you change the settings.

If you don’t have server access, you can install a plugin that will help you with this:

Htaccess File Editor – Safely Edit Htaccess File

You can remove the Htaccess File Editor plugin after you’re done configuring the WP Ghost plugin.

Yes, the WP Ghost plugin works seamlessly even if you use the default permalink settings under Settings > Permalinks.

However, for improved SEO and security, we recommend using the “Post Name” permalink structure instead of the “Plain” (post ID) option. This enhances your site’s readability and search engine ranking and helps obscure potential vulnerabilities tied to the default WordPress paths.

Don’t panic. You can find information here on how you can deactivate the plugin and configure it right:

Disable WP Ghost In Case Of Error

Yes, this feature is available for WP Ghost.

It works with both structures of WP Multisite: subdomain & subdirectories.

WP Ghost works on WP Multisite and you will configure it for the entire network.

Multisite counts just as one site. Because the settings and usage will happen in Network > Plugins, and not on each individual site.

The Ghost Mode also works with Apache, Nginx, IIS and LiteSpeed servers.

Read More: Customize Paths with WP Ghost

Hide Website from Theme Detectors and Hackers

First, follow the instructions to set up the WP Ghost in Safe Mode or Ghost Mode and secure your website.

Here is the tutorial that will help you hide and secure your website:
Hide Your Site From Theme Detectors and Hackers Bots

Website Security Check

After securing the website, you need to check its security. Use Security Check from WP Ghost and third-party security scanning websites to check for all possible vulnerabilities.

• https://sitecheck.sucuri.net/
• https://www.immuniweb.com/websec/

Theme Detectors Check

Now, check if the WordPress CMS is hidden from Theme Detectors and Hackers. Use external WordPress detectors that will check for CMS, version, WP paths, plugins, themes, and everything that might lead to the WordPress CMS.

http://whatwpthemeisthat.com/
http://www.wpthemedetector.com/
https://whatcms.org/
https://hidemywpghost.com/#security_check