Warning: Your CMS Isn't As Secure As You Think It Is

To say that cybersecurity is critical for businesses in 2023 is an understatement. Each year, threat actors make off with over $8.0 trillion from their nefarious exploits and hacks. In fact, the average business's website is attacked an average of 172 times PER DAY, an increase of 210% compared to the year 2020. And, if any of those attacks are successful, chances are, your business could close its doors within 6 months due to the overwhelming damage caused by the breach.

This puts business owners and IT in a bit of a pickle. On the one hand, you need a website to tap into the +$500 billion in eCommerce revenue and +$700 billion in digital transformation revenue on the line. On the other hand, popular Content Management Systems (CMS) like WordPress, Drupal, and Joomla, are riddled with vulnerabilities — leaving you to bounce between the urge to tap into new, disruptive digital revenue streams and the fear of threat actors (those who intentionally exploit weaknesses in computers, networks, websites, and systems to carry out disruptive attacks), sinking your entire business.

At Marketpath, we're out to solve this problem with functional website management. Here's how.

The CMS Security Problem

Building websites isn't easy. Managing all of the content (i.e., posts, videos, graphics, etc.) that goes on that website is nearly impossible without the right content management system (CMS.) These CMS solutions come in all shapes-and-sizes. But, there is one that stands above the rest in terms of the user base — WordPress.

40%+ of the internet is powered by WordPress. It's a big deal. But, while WordPress certainly has plenty of customizability and mass appeal, it's starting to show some cracks at the surface, cracks caused by the ever-encroaching hands of malicious threat actors.

In 2022, the number of WordPress vulnerabilities increased by 25%. To put that into perspective, there were over 500 (2 per day) WordPress vulnerabilities discovered by security researchers at Imperva. And, this doesn't even begin to touch the surface of WordPress's alarming security issue. WPScan — database of WordPress vulnerabilities — puts the current number of WordPress core, plugin and theme vulnerabilities at 38,802. That's an absolutely staggering number of vulnerabilities. In fact, over 70% of ALL WordPress installs are currently vulnerable.

And, these vulnerabilities come big and small. From the infamous WPGateway attack on over 280,000 WordPress sites to eCommerce vulnerabilities that open the pathway of attack for millions of shoppers, WordPress has vulnerabilities.

This is a scary time to own a website for business owners. The average cost of a ransomware attack on a company is over $4.5 million (hence, why small businesses go bust after a single attack). But, you can't prevent cybersecurity instances when your CMS is filled with holes. To be clear, WordPress isn't necessarily intrinsically vulnerable — though it certainly has some shady moments, like when it decided to ignore a serious vulnerability for 2+ years. WordPress is a target simply because of its size and its open-source nature. When you make your source code public, shady GitHub groups and nefarious people are going to dig into it to see what they can leverage to create mayhem.

So, what do you do?

The Marketpath Difference

In our current security ecosystem, does it really make sense to pick a CMS that has vulnerability issues? Do you want to have any security components that are out of your control? At Marketpath, we think companies deserve better. We've built a hyper-secure CMS that's jam-packed with the features that our customers love. And, we're always adding new, unique features to give our customers additional capabilities to help them keep up with cutting-edge web development strategies.

Let's go over a few core components that makes Marketpath a marketplace differentiator.

1. Super Security

Marketpath is a closed-source CMS that provides unparalleled security for developers, agency owners, and businesses. Not only is our entire ecosystem contained, but we have around-the-clock security experts and we practice security-centric development.

We're serious about security. Our platform has no 3rd party plugins (93.3% of CMS vulnerabilities are related to plugins!), and we even provide all of our users with free SSL certificates.

2. Fully Managed

Our service is "fully managed" because we take care of all of the small stuff. From automatic load-balancing, database failover, website security, and monitoring to backups and updates, we're your non-stop website concierge service. Why sweat the small stuff? You focus on the big picture; we'll handle the details.

3. 100% Control

We have an amazing team of coders. (You probably do, too.) And, we know that there is more than one way to build a website. We give you 100% control of your website's rendered output. Who says a closed-source CMS can't be customizable? Plus, we have some incredible personalization features glued to our system. Extendable objects and custom fields make content workflow creation a breeze, and our datastore capabilities can help you create dynamic, real-time personalization features that keep your customers on their toes.

4. Easy-code Capability

We always give you the option to dig into some code. But for many agencies and businesses, that's not feasible. You don't have the budget or the time to hire a programmer. Our entire CMS can be utilized with HTML-only. You don't need to know Java, C, or PHP. Instead, you can build an amazing website without having to demolish your budget on a senior developer.

5. Optimization

Speed matters. A tiny delay in your website load time can cause up to 50% of your visitors to leave your site. That's why we give you image optimization and rapid form builders that allow you to scale your website without sacrificing speed. It's a win-win!