[dropcap]B[/dropcap]logging is one of the most popular forms of internet activity for people with ideas to share. Whether it’s a political agenda, ideas for saving money, or just a place to share laughs with readers, a blog is a great way to satisfy the urge to write.
For bloggers who write very well and enjoy great popularity, money also comes into the pictures. Advertisements and endorsements can generate considerable money for the authors of the blog.
But as with any form of success, a popular blog brings its set of headaches. Avoiding hackers on your blog is of utmost importance because a damaging intrusion by hackers could mean the end of the road. Follow these basic safety tips to protect your online journal.
Use Good Security Measures
As is always best, let’s start with our own behavior. We all know to watch passwords, firewalls, and all of that basic stuff at the user level. But once you graduate to a blog with heavier traffic and content stored elsewhere, you have other things to take into consideration. Virtualization security is critically important to make sure that your content and the related links don’t accept unwelcome visitors.
It’s very important to remember that if your blog grows enough to achieve the level of success you are hoping for, there will be more security issues than you will have time to deal with personally. So counting on your software becomes ever more important.
Stay alert to what this software tells you. Keep it up to date, and when it alerts you to something, be sure to respond quickly and decisively.
Know Your Advertisers
Ads can be a great way to increase revenue from your blog, but they can also be an open window to hackers. If you aren’t familiar with a potential advertiser, try to find out more before letting them operate on your site.
That goes for your content as well. Check the links being used in SEO content provided by outside parties and make sure that those writers have linked to reputable companies.
Bad advertisements–you could call them “badvertisements”–open lots of portals for malware, spyware, and hackers. Your loyal readers click on an appealing ad and end up getting hacked. It’s dangerous to you in two ways: First, you may get hacked yourself, and second, you may end up losing a lot of readers, which are the heart of your blog’s success.
Be Wary of Commenters
Any online forum, message board, or comments section can easily have spam posts appear. Most of these are generated overseas, so they can be pretty easy to spot with their quasi-English syntax.
Others are a little better at blending in. They may use terminology that would suggest that they are legitimate, but they eventually tip their hands. The bots used to generate the comments are unlikely to respond to comments from real users, giving you an easy red flag to identify.
The most important thing is to use a comments or discussion section that is secure, using some type of verification system like Captcha to verify that posts are being made by a real person. Moderating comments is a good idea as well, as long as you can keep up with the demand.
There’s no such thing as totally safe online activity anymore. Anything we can do can be hacked by unscrupulous people who want to take advantage of what we have worked hard to build. Fortunately, with some common-sense actions and investment in the right software and other tools, you can keep your blog safe, secure, and profitable.
