The malicious activities have been increasing and affecting the eCommerce industry to the core. And the Magento store merchants are no different. Right from stealing users’ data to spamming and phishing, you invite them all when you have a Magento store in your kitty.

If you have an eCommerce store powered by Magento and are worried about the security of your store? Not anymore!

There may be many crooks around there who are always on the verge of prowling or spying to get access to your admin panel. But, if you are planning to prevent such malicious activities, you have definitely come to the right place.

Follow these best practices to protect your Magento store for better:

Initiate A Two-Step Verification Process

One of the best practices to secure your Magento-powered store is to use a two-factor authentication (TFA). This enables store merchants to access the store after passing both the steps. First step involves logging in with the right credentials. The second step includes passing through the two-step verification by providing the OTP or the security code that will be sent to email or registered mobile number. This practice will prevent any hacker from entering your store and access crucial information on your site’s administration panel even after knowing the login ID and password.

Install Only Reliable Magento Extensions

A majority of store merchants happened to install third-party extensions to their website in order to enhance the features and functionalities of your Magento-based store. Sometimes, there is a malicious code present in the extension that can harm your store, or simply put, your business data can be stolen. You should be very cautious and do your research before going for third-party extensions. Make sure that the third-party extension is from a reputable source, has an exemplary track record and is also maintained and updated on a regular basis.

Make Use Of A Secure FTP

Most hackers use interception and guess the FTP password to attack the Magento-based stores. In order to protect your online store from such hackers, it becomes imperative for you to not to use an obvious password, instead, use a strong password that’s not that easy to hack. You may also use the secured file transfer protocol (SFTP).

Use An SSL layer To Secure Customer Information

eCommerce stores, no matter how or what you do, will always be vulnerable to cyber attacks. Hackers can easily steal data that has been sent across unencrypted connections. An SSL layer is crucial if you have a Magento store. With an SSL layer, you can easily secure sensitive information such as login credentials, credit card details, internet banking password, and other important details that you can’t afford to put at stake. To counter this challenge, it is necessary to purchase an SSL certificate from a reliable source and then configure it on your store by selecting the “Use Secure URLs” option in the system configuration menu.

Pick A Strong Admin Name & Password

In order to avoid any unauthorized access to your Magento-powered store, you must ensure that the login credentials (including the admin name and password) are unique and unusual, and not something that is easily guessed. Make it difficult for your potential hackers to hack your sensitive information.

Here are certain things you must make sure while setting up your password:

• It contains both upper and lower cases of letters
• It comprises a minimum of 10 characters, not less than that
• It shouldn’t be same as your other passwords
• Avoid mentioning the company’s name
• It must contain special characters (such as @, <, ?, *, etc.)

Do Have A Backup Plan Ready

It is good to take stringent measures to prevent hacking, but what if it still gets hacked? You must always have an active backup plan ready. This way you ensure that there is continuity of the store services in case things go wrong and your website gets crashed. Afterall, you can’t just afford to lose your data, right?

Take backup on a regular basis and download the data every now and then. You may also opt for Magento maintenance and support services, if need be, to keep things always moving for you.

Magento reCAPTCHA Is Your Go-To Choice

Strengthen the security of your Magento store, Google reCAPTCHA is also a good option for you. It will help you in safeguarding your main store page along with the registration page, website login and the admin page. Google reCAPTCHA helps in determining whether the user who is trying to gain access to your store is a robot or a human. If it is not a human, it won’t proceed.

Opt For The latest Magento Version

It is the responsibility of a Magento store merchant to upgrade their store to the latest version, that’s when a stable version is available. Installation of security patches is also important to combat against the online security threats and breaches.

Go For Exclusive, Dedicated Hosting Plan

Don’t compromise on the security of your Magento store by going for shared hosting plans. Choose a dedicated hosting for your store.

The above mentioned tips can help you effectively boost the security of your Magento store. Take note of them and use them when required.

Conclusion

You must always remember that customers prefer to shop online from an eCommerce store that is not only secure, but safe too. Customers are said to be the king in the eCommerce industry, and so, it becomes imperative that you do not overlook the security aspect of your Magento store. It could drastically affect your store sales, and profits for that matter.

The aforesaid tips would make it a five-finger exercise for you to make your Magento store safe, secure and stronger than before. But, if you find it difficult to do so, you can always hire an expert.

Magnomates is a leading Magento store development service provider catering to all your store security needs with great efficacy and ease. Get in touch with us at info@magnomates.com to know more about our value-based services or simply share your requirements with us to get started.