If your website is the storefront, web hosting is the foundation beneath it. And like any foundation, when it cracks, everything above it suffers. Speed slows. Vulnerabilities surface. Search rankings slip. And trust? Gone in seconds.
Today’s users expect fast, seamless, and secure experiences. Google does too. Which is why your hosting environment isn’t just a technical choice. . . it’s a strategic one. The difference between average and exceptional often starts before a single line of code is written.
Think of web hosting like the infrastructure of a high-performance building: reinforced, responsive, and built to scale. But unlike a physical foundation, it must be continually maintained and upgraded to keep pace with evolving threats and expectations.
To stay competitive, brands must lean on the best web hosting practices to not just to meet expectations, but to exceed them.
This guide breaks down the best practices that ensure your web hosting setup isn’t just keeping up: it’s giving your website the speed, stability, and security edge it needs to lead.
Skip to What You Need to Know
What is Web Hosting?
Every website on the internet is hosted on at least a single web server. Typically, a web server is responsible for hosting hundreds of websites. Think of a web server like a library catalog with hundreds of books (websites). Like the catalog, a web server simply stores the websites and makes them accessible to everyone on the internet.
The websites will function optimally so long as the web server is intact. But, any attack on the web server will automatically affect the websites hosted on it. As such, web hosting security is important, for both web hosting service providers and website owners.
Best Practices for Web Hosting
Cyberattacks have grown more frequent and sophisticated lately. Hence, using old cybersecurity practices for web hosting isn’t good enough to protect web servers and websites from malicious attacks. Here are five of the best practices for web hosting security and top performance:
1. Regular Backup of Web Data
One of the best ways to stay safe against cyberattacks is to periodically backup website data. With backups, no matter how often the web server or website gets compromised, it’s easy to restore the hosted websites back to full function. As such, regularly backup your web data manually or schedule automatic backups. To be safer, store additional backups offline on a local computer or hard driver that’s disconnected from the main server. This way, direct attacks to the server will not affect the separate backup.
2. Use SSL Encryption
SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) is a standard and non-negotiable security measure for web hosting. An SSL certificate basically encrypts all data exchanges between a web server and a local browser. This way, privata data cannot be intercepted by third parties. With SSL certification, you’re not just protecting internet users who visit a hosted website, you’re also building your reputation as a trustworthy web hosting service provider.
3. Implement Secure File Transfer Protocol (SFTP)
Most websites are designed to use standard FTP (File Transfer Protocol) for data exchange such as uploads, downloads, and other user inputs and attachments. But this leaves the data exposed to malicious third-parties e.g. hackers. Besides using SSL encryption, implementing the Secure File Transfer Protocol (SFTP) ensures that all data inputs and attachments such as uploads, login details, payment information etc., are encrypted against third-party tampering and data theft. SFTP also ensures that malicious inputs are encoded to prevent malicious operations on the website.
4. Set Up a Web Firewall
Having a firewall set up is one of the most fundamental web security practices that both website owners and web hosting service providers must live by. A firewall is basically a vetting shield that filters and monitors traffic between websites, web apps, and local browsers. It has an updatable list of inputs, programs, and requests that are automatically flagged as malicious. Once the firewall detects any suspicious input, it blocks it immediately thus protecting the website from cyberattacks like SQL injection, and also protects local computers too. Usually, web hosting service providers install a web firewall to their server to strengthen its hosting security.
5. Restrict Server and Website Access
A standard rule is that no stranger should have access to backend mechanisms of both the server and website. Even regular employees should be restricted from accessing sensitive backend processes. Why? Careless access could easily result in a data breach or worse – ransomware attack.
To prevent unauthorized access to the server and hosted websites, you should adopt the following practices:
- Use multi-factor authentication such as one-time passwords, fingerprints, and remote access approval.
- Set up time-limited sessions to prevent prolonged access. Session time-outs ensure that malicious operations are interrupted.
- Create limited access roles such that authorized persons enjoy limited access to specific tasks.
- IP Listing – this is basically creating a list of IP addresses that are permitted to access servers and backend processes, while creating a comprehensive blocklist of all other IP addresses and URLs.
Pro Tip: Consistently Run Updates
Software and server updates are essential in keeping websites secure from malicious attacks. Seeing as cyberattacks are getting more sophisticated, hackers are more likely to exploit outdated systems. As such, you should regularly update the server and web security softwares since every update usually comes with updated security patches against previous vulnerabilities.
Conclusion
Most times, website owners focus on optimizing website security measures. But, they often fail to consider the security of the server on which their websites are hosted. Sadly, an attack to a web server is an attack to the websites hosted on it. Web hosting security is all about implementing security measures to protect both web servers and websites from cyberattacks.
As such, it’s not enough to protect your websites, it’s more important to look out for web hosting service providers that implement high security mechanisms for their servers. When choosing a web hosting service provider, look out for their security practices. At the very least, a web hosting service provider should prioritize data encryption, secure data exchange, backups, security updates, and firewalls.
