[webarch-wp] Blocking brute force attacks against the WordPress XMLRPC interface

[Chris Croome]

Hi

For some months we have seen high volumes of attacks against the
WordPress XMLRPC interface and didn't realise what these were doing
until one of our members linked to the following in our IRC channel
(thanks Des!):

- Brute Force Amplification Attacks Against WordPress XMLRPC

  Instead of going against wp-login.php (which can be easily blocked or
  protected via .htaccess) or doing a single attempt against xmlrpc,
  attackers are leveraging the system.multicall method to attempt to
  guess hundreds of passwords within just one HTTP request.

  https://blog.sucuri.net/2015/10/brute-force-amplification-attacks-against-wordpress-xmlrpc.html

We have been installing the Stop XML-RPC Attack plugin on WordPress
sites and would urge everybody to install this plugin to protect your
sites against these attacks:

- https://wordpress.org/plugins/stop-xmlrpc-attack/

If anyone needs any help with their WordPress site please get in touch.

All the best

Chris

-- 
Webarchitects Co-operative
http://webarchitects.coop/
+44 114 276 9709
@webarchcoop