Critical WordPress Exploit in Version 2.1.3
A critical exploit has been discovered in WordPress 2.1.3 related to the way WordPress admin cookies are accessed. A malicious user could possibly steal your admin password cookie and gain admin rights to your website. This is only an issue if you are using the default WordPress prefix of wp_ or are using an easy to figure out prefix. Unfortunately the only fix currently available is to upgrade to WordPress 2.2–which has it’s own set of major issues due to the widget changes and other new coding conventions introduced in that version.
I wish I could provide an easy fix, but there isn’t one. If you have a WordPress 2.1.3 site with a standard setting for the prefix (in the wp-config.php file) then you really should think about upgrading–do research on the upgrade though, its not very straightforward.
Change your WordPress prefix
One area of WordPress setup that many people miss is changing their database prefix. This is a setting in the wp-config.php file that determines what WordPress uses to talk to your database. By default WordPress adds wp_ to the front of all of your tables, but you should consider changing this to something very random.
Why? Well, an exploit has just surfaced for the 2.1.3 version of WordPress (and possibly previous versions) that allows someone to steal your admin password–but it only works if they know your WordPress prefix. Of course since most people haven’t changed this they know to use wp_.
Unfortunately it’s not a simple fix AFTER you have installed things. The prefix gets written to your entire database, so DON’T change it now after you’ve installed and are running, it’ll cause you to create an entirely new database within your current one, but not set to your current settings. The actual fix would be to download your database .sql file and use a text editor to change the entire thing (Ugh!).
Anyway, I’m updating my install tutorial to mention this important step.
Webcomic Community at Transplant Comics
The next in my series of Webcomic sites using WordPress is Transplant Comics, where you don’t get just a comic, but a whole community of comics! One of the best aspect of WordPress is it’s flexible ability to adapt to whatever you need it to be– In this case a portal site for a large group of webcomics.