Sheffield WordPress Security Advice

Wordpress is a superb system for website development, allowing complex functionality, including full eCommerce without huge development costs.

The platform is about as future proof as you can get, is built with good SEO in mind and allows full content management for the site owner once built.

We are increasingly building more and more sites using WordPress, in fact this very site is built using the platform.

Downsides – there really aren’t that many, but one thing to pay attention to is site security.

Virtually any site can be compromised or hacked if someone a) knows what they are doing b) has the time to spend trying to get into a site.

Wordpress is no different and as it is one of the most popular platform in the world, there are people out there that make it their business to target WordPress sites.

Last week there were reports of a series of Brute Force Attacks on the WordPress Platform, the botnet attack targeted sites with the default user name “admin”.

None of our sites were affected as we take site security seriously, to help you, here are a few simple tips to help secure your WordPress site.

Sheffield WordPress Security Advice

1. Never, never, never use “Admin” as your admin username, unfortunately “Admin” appears as the default username (which is why hackers target it). Make sure you change it when you are first installing, as once you accept the default username, you cant then change it through the Dashboard.

What if your site is already set up with the default admin? Don’t panic, install the following plug in and change it using the plug in.

Get it here:

2. Use a strong password!

Don’t use “password” or your site name as your password, don’t use “clever passwords” such as pa55w0rd, 123mydomian456 because quite frankly they aren’t that clever.

Use a unique password that includes letters, numbers and a character such as %, and use at least 8 characters.

3. Use the recently introduced 2 step authentication system.

4. When setting up the database change the database prefix from wp_ to something else.

5. Install a security plugin, our favourite simple plugin is Sucuri, it will scan the site for problems and it also includes a simple, 5 step set of 1 click hardening options.

Get it here:

6. Make sure you are using the latest release of WordPress.

7. Make sure you regularly update your plugins.

8. Most importantly make sure you back up the full site and database on a weekly or daily basis depending how often you make site changes, just incase any system or plugin update cause a conflict or you do get hacked, the best plugin we have found is backupwordpress.

Get it here:

Finally if you do get hacked, we can usually help to clean your site, clear any malware, remove any  backdoor scripts and then constantly monitor your site for only £125.00 a year, a small price to pay for peace of mind!

We hope this advice is of use and if you do need any further help, don’t hesitate to contact Team Brightstar.

Note: All information is supplied in good faith, based on our experience of using the above methods. However due to the WordPress platform being open source and the constantly changing nature of website design and its various platforms, Brightstar Creative can accept no responsibility for any problems resulting from the installation and usage of the above third party plugins or the suggested methods of basic security.

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So, just what is the strange story of the Creative Sheffield Beard?

Over the past few months we have, almost out of nowhere, been inundated with new clients and additional work. In the process we have picked up some well known local companies and charities, one or two large companies from further afield and finished our first project for the largest company in the world at what it does.

This has all come as a bit of a surprise, a welcome surprise, but a surprise nonetheless.

It set us thinking, why now, what have we been doing differently?

Is it our creativity, our competitive pricing structure, our willingness to go that extra mile for all our customers, or the friendly, relaxed, helpful way we do what we do?

It could be any or all of the above, but we have a feeling it may be “The Beard”, let me explain further…

Around the time the influx of new clients began, I decided to grow a beard, of sorts, and I am starting to think it could be the cause of our recent success. Could it be “The Beard” gives off an air of creative authority, are people saying, “hey, that guy with the beard, I would like to bet he really knows his stuff when it comes to creative graphic and web design – let’s give Brightstar a chance”.

It has now got to the stage where I am afraid to remove it (just in case), could my beard be the equivalent of Samson’s hair, if so that scares me a little as we all know what happened to him!

I am seriously considering asking all staff members to grow beard’s, after all if it works for me it could work for them and with my business head on all I can see is lots and lots of new work.

In an effort to convince the team I spent some of my own time creating these life like mock-up’s, to show them just what they are missing – behold The Power of the Creative Beard!

Mmmmmm – maybe not?

What do you think? – If you think there is some mileage in our Creative Sheffield Beard Theory – please like this page on Facebook, Tweet about this page, or use your favourite button below to spread the word.

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We were delighted to be asked to create the branding for the Sheffield Cancer Research Centre. We have been working on the logo over the past month and we are currently fine tuning the final version.

The final logo design has now been chosen and we are now giving the client a number of colour options.

Colour schemes can make a big difference to how a brand, and the organisation it represents, is perceived, to make sure we “get it right,” we are currently running a wide range of colour schemes past the people that make the decisions, after all they have to be 100% happy that the final solution is the best one for their particular needs.

The highly respected research centre brings together world-class scientists, doctors and nurses in Yorkshire to push forward advances in cancer treatment faster than ever before.

The Sheffield Cancer Research Centre is a partnership between Cancer Research UK, Yorkshire Cancer Research, the University of Sheffield, and the Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust.

We hope our final branding will reflect the professionalism and dedication of the centre and all its amazing staff.

Donate to Cancer Research UK here:

http://supportus.cancerresearchuk.org/donate

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The team at Brightstar Creative, would like to wish each and every one of our customers a very Merry Christmas and a Prosperous New Year.

We have some exciting developments planned for 2013, these will include widening our offerings to our customer base, a possible move down the corridor, a new website for all your promotional gifts, working with an extremely worthy local charity and venturing into new markets!

We will be closing the big old church doors on the 21st of December and unlocking them again on the 2nd of January.

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We recently became involved in helping The Sheffield Antiques Quarter revitalise the quarter which currently includes 6 centres and 14 shops. We were asked to design and print the new SAQ “trail guide” including the definitive map to the area which has since appeared in numerous publications.

We wanted to get involved with The Sheffield Antiques Quarter as geographically we are close by and more importantly, we really believe in what Hendrika Stevens and the other members are trying to do, the quarter can only help revitalise the area and add another point of cultural interest to our great city, helping to make it another shopping destination.

Want to know more? Visit the Christmas Fair and official launch on the 25th on November – a perfect time to buy some very special presents!

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Creative Sheffield People…

As creative people, lovers of other creative people and big fans of Sheffield. We have decided to produce a bi-monthly “Creative Sheffield People” spotlight page. This will focus on someone or something, we at Brightstar consider to be pretty cool.

We will be promoting one fellow creative every 2 months.

Availability will be limited, but if you know of any Creative Sheffield People you feel we should take a look at please let us knoww.

So who or what are we looking for?

The answer is we aren’t exactly sure but we will no doubt be including, artists, musicians, sculptors, film makers, novelists, cartoonists, comedians, set designers, drama groups, graffiti artists, fashion designers, and, well you get the idea.

See you there!

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Over the next week we are investing heavily in upgrading the majority of our software packages to the very latest versions. We will be installing across all our Macs (and PC’s) and have no doubt this may throw up a problem or two, so please gentle with us

Once we are fully up to date and have ironed out any conflicts we will be able to create even higher quality, super creative design work for you, our valuable customers and help our business systems to be even more efficient.

Here is our up date list (gulp)…

Apple OS

Adobe InDesign
Adobe Illustrator
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Dreamweaver
Adobe Fireworks
Adobe Acrobat Pro
Adobe Bridge

Microsoft Word (Mac + PC)
Microsoft Excel (Mac + PC)
Microsoft Powerpoint (Mac + PC)
Microsoft Outlook (Mac + PC)

Microsoft Publisher

Quickbooks Pro

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Some of the Brightstar Team attended the Sheffield Star Football Awards at the DoubleTree Hilton Hotel on Sunday night. It was a fantastic night with a number of football stars attending, including Sir Gordon Banks, Chris Waddle and Tony Currie. It has been good to see both Sheffield teams doing so well this year and the awards reflected that by the Sheffield clubs being awarded joint team of the year.

Featured in the above picture are: Darren Pass (Brightstar Creative), Rich Francis (Lewis Francis Blackburn Bray), Chris Waddle, Wayne Cramer (GW Energy).

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We are not sure what we have been doing differently at the Brightstar base but during the last month we have picked up new customers in London, Barnsley, Pontefract, Knottingley and Monk Breton.

Now we realise this may not quite be world wide domination, but having been predominantly focused on improving the quality of design and marketing throughout the Sheffield region – our recent trips outside the Sheffield postcode have made a refreshing change and we have also had a chance to test out the Tom Tom.

Whats even better is that each and every one of our new “foreign” customers have come by recommendation.

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We were approached by the Sheffield Star to appear in this months business supplement focusing on start up companies, which of course we were more than happy to do.

We agreed because we have always believed getting your new company brand right from the outset is extremely important and even if you don’t use Brightstar it is essential you use a good design company, not paying for good design really is a false economy. After all your marketing material, including your website, may be the first thing a potential customer sees of your company or product and they will make a judgement based on what they see, getting it wrong could cost you sales.

We have worked with a wide range of start up companies over our 20 years in business supplying branding, marketing materials, print and web site design and feel we are ideally placed to offer valuable advice and design expertise to anyone starting a new company.

As well as offering discounts to start up companies we have a wide range of contacts in most fields of business who we are happy to recommend if we feel they may be of use.

If you are thinking of starting a company and need any free advice or an idea of costs to help with your business plan, give us a call, we will do whatever we can to help.

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