How to block an IP address in WordPress? (Prohibit spam and hacker attacks)

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Have you noticed that there are many login requests coming from the same IP addresses? This is a classic symptom of a brute force attack on your site. As your website grows, it will also come with its fair share of security issues. This could be a brute force attack or spam comments. But if not dealt with properly, these attacks can slow down your site or, in the worst case, lead to a hack. Issues like a constant flurry of login requests or spam comments may seem like minor annoyances, but they can actually lead to bigger problems.

If attackers find a way to access your website, they can store unwanted files on your website, steal your information, redirect visitors, or even tamper with your website and demand money. Luckily, there is an easy way to protect your site from known intruders. An effective way to protect your website from spammers and intruders is to block the IP address in WordPress. Let's discuss the what, why and how to block IP addresses in WordPress.

The content of the article:

• Reasons for Blocking IP Addresses in WordPress
• How to Find Suspicious IP Addresses in WordPress Blacklist?
• How to successfully block IP addresses in WordPress?
• Why You Shouldn't Rely on IP Blocking?
• Blacklisting IP Addresses in WordPress: Conclusion

Reasons for Blocking IP Addresses in WordPress

Malicious IP blocking in WordPress is a quick and effective way to fight spam, unwanted login requests, malware, DDOS attacks, or even hacking attempts. But the most common reasons for blocking IP addresses in WordPress are spam comments and hacking attempts.

Spam comments

Any comments not related to your site may be classified as spam. They are often left by bots and contain random links or advertisements that could be malicious.
While most WordPress owners choose to manually approve comments, too many spam comments can make it difficult for website owners to moderate comments.
This is when blocking IP addresses can come in handy. By blocking IP addresses that send spam comments, you can easily block them from accessing your website.

Hacking attempts

Attackers often attempt to hack through input fields such as a comment section or a contact form. This is known as cross-site scripting and is a serious security risk for your website. This type of attack can result in attackers gaining access to your website or extracting sensitive information.

Blocking suspicious IP addresses in WordPress can help prevent such attacks and increase the overall security of WordPress.

How to Find Suspicious IP Addresses in WordPress Blacklist?

As we discussed earlier, every website keeps a record of visitors. Thus, you can find out the IP address of anyone who left a comment or visited your site. There are different ways to do this. Let's go through all of them one by one.

Find IP Address Using WordPress Comments Panel

The WordPress Dashboard can help you find most of the things on your site. You can also find spam commenters' IP addresses here.
All you have to do is navigate to the comments in your WordPress dashboard.

On the next page you will find all the comments and the IP addresses of those who left them on your site.
Write down any IP addresses from comments that seem inappropriate or spam. These comments may have links or posts in foreign languages.
Once all suspicious addresses have been flagged, we can proceed to block them.

Find IP address using raw access log

You can use WordPress comments for spam commenters, but how do you find the IP addresses of the scammers who are sending a huge number of requests to your website's server? You can use your site's access logs for this.

• Go to your hosting account's cPanel dashboard and search for "logs". Either to another hosting panel to which you have access, you can also request such logs from your hosting provider.
• In this section you will find "raw access logs".

• Then click on your domain name and the access logs will be downloaded to your computer in a .gz archive file.
• You can extract the logs with an archive file program such as Winzip.
• Open the logs in a text editor such as notepad.

• Here you can see all the IP addresses that have made requests to your site. If the IP address is sending you constant requests, you can write down the blocking address.

You must ensure that you do not inadvertently block legitimate visitors or yourself from your website. To verify this, you can search the Internet for IP addresses using IP lookup tools to make sure that these IP addresses are suspicious or malicious at the very least.

How to successfully block IP addresses in WordPress?

There are two ways to block IP addresses in WordPress. One is through a security plugin like MalCare, All In One WP Security or Wordfence Security, they will streamline the process and block IP addresses automatically.

If you know very little about website security, this is the best option for you. But if you want to do it yourself, there is a manual method for blocking IP addresses in WordPress, which we will discuss in detail.

Block an IP Address in WordPress with a Security Plugin

MalCare is specifically designed to protect against suspicious IP addresses and malware. Thus, blocking IP addresses with MalCare is done automatically.

You don't have to go through the entire process of finding and blocking IP addresses because MalCare will do it for you. MalCare's powerful firewall detects spam and suspicious visitors and blocks them automatically. In addition, in the firewall's IP address log, you will also find the country associated with the IP address.

So, if you notice that many IP addresses from a particular country seem to be malicious, you can block all problematic IP addresses from that country using MalCare's geo-blocking feature. Of course, you can only do this if you don't expect legitimate traffic from those countries, so use this feature wisely.

Manually Deny an IP Address in WordPress

If you prefer to manually block IP addresses in WordPress, there are several ways to do so. Depending on your comfort level, choose the one that seems the most suitable for your needs.

Using the WordPress Comment Blacklist to Prevent Comment Spam

There is an option in your WordPress dashboard to blacklist certain comments, which prevents the commenter from posting more comments on your website.

To use this option, follow these steps to block IP addresses in WordPress:

• Log in to your WordPress dashboard.
• Then from the menu go to "Settings» > «Discussion".
• On the talk page, scroll down and you'll see the "Blacklisted comments".
• Copy and paste the IP addresses you want to block into this section.
• Don't forget to save your changes.
• WordPress will successfully block these IP addresses from leaving spam comments.

This will prevent spammers from posting comments, but they will still be able to access your website. This can be a potential security risk as attackers can hack into your site in other ways.

Using an IP blocker in cPanel

Most hosting providers also offer the option to block suspicious IP addresses in WordPress. If you prefer this method, you can block suspicious IP addresses from your hosting account by following these steps:

• Sign in to your hosting account.
• Login to cPanel and go to the section called "Safety".
• There should be an option in this section to allow you to block IP addresses. On Bluehost, this option is called IP Blocker. Other hosting providers may name it differently.

• Now you need to add all the IPs you marked as suspicious and your hosting provider will block them.

Block an IP address with .htaccess in WordPress

There is another way to block IP addresses in WordPress - you can add these IP addresses directly to your .htaccess file.
The .htaccess file is an important configuration file in your WordPress website. It contains certain rules that offer instructions to the website server.

Note. While this is a legal way to block IP addresses, I don't recommend doing it yourself unless you're confident in your technical abilities. The .htaccess file is an important WordPress file and changing it is a risky business. Small mistakes can break your site. If you must use this method, first make a full backup of your website so that if anything goes wrong, you can restore your WordPress website.

• Login to your WordPress hosting account.
• Go to cPanel and select "Files» > «File Manager".
• In the file manager, the .htaccess file will be in a folder named public_html.

• When you find the file, right-click it and choose Edit.

• Then add the following code snippet to the end of the file

order allow,deny deny from 1.39.175.142 deny from 3.374.983.084 deny from 6.85.093.129 allow from all

• Save Changes

This piece of code will tell your host which IP addresses should be denied access to your site. The IP addresses shown in the code are just examples, replace them with the IP addresses you think are suspicious.

Why You Shouldn't Rely on IP Blocking?

Sometimes when you rely on a free or unreliable WordPress security solution, the result can be unfavorable.

For example, when blocking suspicious IP addresses on your website, your free security plugin can also block clients or team members from accessing it. This can be counterproductive to your site's security and create more problems than it solves.

When this happens, you will have to whitelist the IP addresses and allow return traffic. You can do this with a security plugin or manually, but if you don't have special access requirements, doing it manually can be tedious. Instead, a good firewall will take care of both blocking malicious traffic and allowing access to the right type.

Blacklisting IP Addresses in WordPress: Conclusion

Blocking IP addresses in WordPress is an extremely effective preventative measure to protect your site. This ensures that intruders do not gain any access to your website and they keep their distance before they can cause any serious harm to our website.

If you want this process to be automatic and not bother you with security issues, you can choose a security solution that not only identifies suspicious IP addresses, but blocks them automatically. This way you don't have to worry about any attacks and your site stays safe 24/7.

FAQ

How to block the IP address of my WordPress site?

There are various ways to block an IP address on a WordPress website. But the easiest way is to use a WordPress plugin to block an IP address. It will automatically detect and block suspicious IP addresses of your site. Other ways to blacklist IP addresses in WordPress:

1. Blocking via WordPress Dashboard
2. Using an IP blocker in cPanel
3. Blocking specific IP addresses with .htaccess file

Can I block an IP address in WordPress myself?

Yes, you can block IP addresses in WordPress yourself. First you need to find the specified IP address. Once you've done that, use the comment blacklist option available on your WordPress dashboard.

Alternatively, an IP blocker in cPanel or .htaccess files is another good way to manually block IP addresses in WordPress. You can also manually blacklist IP addresses using the security plugin.

What IP addresses can I block from accessing my website?

If you find any IPs that send repeated login requests or constantly leave spam comments, they are most likely malicious bots. You can block these IP addresses from accessing your WordPress website.

Moreover, if you notice that all these suspicious IP addresses belong to the same region, you can block access to your site for the entire region. However, use this feature with caution.

Is it possible to block the IP addresses of entire countries?

Yes. You can use the geo-blocking tool to block an IP address in WordPress from entire countries. It may seem like overkill, but malicious requests do come from certain regions, and blocking regions can give you peace of mind. But be careful with this feature as it also blocks any legitimate traffic from the country.

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