If you look at your full stats page on WordPress, you will see a section on the bottom right marked ‘Clicks’. This shows you what some readers of your site will have clicked on. In most cases, this is a click to enlarge a photograph, to read a link, or perhaps to investigate the blog of one of your followers.
That is all to be encouraged of course.
I check this section regularly, mostly to see if anyone has followed links I may have added to a post, or which photos are popular enough for readers to want to enlarge them for detail.
To my surprise, and slight concern, the last week or so has shown a few clicks on my own WordPress login. This would show if someone other than me tried to access my admin page. This could have been a mistake of course. Somebody may have wanted to look at a category or post, and clicked in the wrong place. But the other possibility is that someone has been trying to access my admin page, even perhaps attempting to change the password. Fortunately, it would seem that they have been unsuccessful, but there was another attempt this morning.
My first thought was that there would be little purpose in them doing this, but then I thought again. If they managed to hack in, and change my password, then I would have no access to both my WP sites. The hacker could publish posts that might be rude or offensive, and everyone would obviously believe it was me. They could access the lists of my followers, and followed sites, many of which display email addresses. If they so wished, they could spend my money by upgrading the site, and buying expensive themes. This could happen, because WP have my details, after I upgraded recently.
With just a few clicks, a malicious hacker could totally disrupt both my WP sites, cause offence, upset all the years of hard work building a community, and then presumably move on to do the same thing to someone else. I can only imagine the hassle of trying to contact WP to report this. It’s hard enough to get your comments out of Spam, let alone this.
Let’s hope it is nothing at all. But it’s better to be aware, so I thought I would tell everyone.
beetleypete 
Could it be a webcrawler? Something used big name search engines. To be able to process your website and make it available to the public via keywords.
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I suppose it could be anything, Cory. From the comments, it does seem to be on the increase, whatever is behind it.
Best wishes, Pete.
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Thank you, Kevin, for the info. I will definitely let you know if I see something on your site that is questionable. Hope all goes well for you.
Thanks again for the wonderful review! I am still on cloud 9! 😀🤗
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I think you may have posted this comment on the wrong blog, jjspina. 🙂
Best wishes, Pete.
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Oops, sorry. How did that happen?! 🤣
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No idea, but nice to see you! 🙂
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Reblogged this on Have We Had Help? and commented:
Something from Pete, Ollie’s human. 😉
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Thanks for the head’s up. It happened to me but I didn’t think much about it because I have two tier verification to log-in. Back in 2016, I received codes several times to complete my log-in, when I had not tried to log-in.
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Thanks, Xena. It does appear that there have been more attempts to hack bloggers recently.
Best wishes, Pete.
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Thank you for this information, Pete!💝😍
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Reading some of the comments, it does seem to be ‘a thing’ at the moment.
Best wishes, Pete. xx
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It does and I am all about knowing about them things! LOL 😂
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Thanks for the warning, Pete, I’ll look into ours. The amounts on the spams these days are overwhelming, not funny at all.
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Very true, Dina. A real avalanche of Spam just now.
Love from Beetley, Pete and Ollie. X
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I had never checked this before. Thanks, Pete.
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I thought it might be ‘just me’, Jennie. However, judging from the comments, it does seem to be something we have to look out for.
Best wishes, Pete.
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Best to you, Pete.
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I check this every day to see if the links I have added are being clicked on…Today I have one ..I do have extra verification and to edit anything on my account WP send a code to my phone annoying for me at times but unfortunately a necessity. Good post, Pete we need to be aware 🙂
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Thanks, Carol. As I have seen from the comments, there is definitely something suspicious going on!
Best wishes, Pete.
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Seems that way everywhere now Pete 🙂
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Thank you so much for posting this Pete. I wasn’t aware of this.
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From some of the comments I received, it appears it is not just happening to me, Kim.
Best wishes, Pete.
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I just checked mine and it hasn’t happened to me in the last year thank goodness. I’ll keep looking regularly though.
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Good advice my friend….I keep an eye on my stuff daily…..others need to know the importance of checking your site out….chuq
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Glad to hear you are vigilant, chuq. 🙂
Best wishes, Pete.
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Last week, one page completely vanished from my WordPress site. When I got in touch with WordPress I was told this could only happen if someone actively deleted it, which suggests someone had hacked my site. I can’t think why anyone would go to the bother of hacking my site just to delete a page. WordPress don’t even have my payment details, as I haven’t upgraded.
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Thanks for adding your own experience, Annabelle. It does seem pointless, what they did, but perhaps it was simply malicious? Or maybe they were trying it out, to see what they could get away with? We are all going to have to pay more attention to our blogs, I suspect.
Best wishes, Pete.
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Just checked the clicks on my stats page, and at least no one seems to have clicked on my WordPress login. Thanks for the heads-up, I’ll keep an eye on that in future.
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As my parents taught me, it’s always better to err on the side of caution. It never hurts to glance at stats, especially if you have stats that show attempts at logins. A good password for your account, and as someone suggested earlier, a backup account so you could get in if your main is compromised.
Wordfence says it has blocked 7,905 malicious login attempts. Askimet has blocked 4,082 known spam comments in the last couple of years.
Stay safe.
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Thanks, Ron. I had a good idea you would be on the ball with this issue.
Best wishes, Pete.
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Pete, there is a glitch somewhere, and it’s scary. I was on someone’s else’s blog reading and it was going to allow me to change or delete their share buttons with an (x) – which is not appropriate. I didn’t click on the share buttons or delete them but I could have. Something is really wrong.
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Thanks for that extra information, Lara. I think we all need to take a closer look at our blogging security.
Best wishes, Pete.
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On my self-hosted site, Wordfence, who protect my site informed me of over 20 attempted logins for the first week of March. Typical trying names as: admin, login, cabbieblog. My advice is to create a ‘back door’ login, using an arbitrary name and password that you never use except when hacked. You can also login via WordPress.com and I can using my Patreon details. Good luck
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Thanks for those tips, David. Interesting to know that it isn’t just me.
Best wishes, Pete.
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Always good to change your password every now and again, but I think WP will also automatically lock out after a third incorrect attempt to log on, at which point you should be notified. Just as long as your password isn’t ‘Ollie’ you should be good 🙂
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Oh no, you guessed it! (Nothing that obvious)
Cheers mate, Pete. 🙂
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I wonder who wrote that serial about Roxanne, Finn, and Roland?
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Serial? What serial?
Best wishes, Pete.
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I think I’m safe, I had one click on one picture 🤣🙄 cheers though!
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Just had a thought.. has this co-incided with my suspicious untrustyness??? 😀
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No. It started after I paid to upgrade. Maybe they think I have money to spend? 🙂
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Things are so spooky sometimes.
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I may never have said this before. But I really like you, and appreciate you too. 🙂 🙂
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Aw shucks! Well you know we have a mutual admiration society goin’on 😘
Unless this is an accident and you meant to reply to someone else 🤣🤣
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Not an accident at all. Just in an unusually good mood. Maybe I am going to have a stroke? 🙂 🙂
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No don’t do that!
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That’s fine, FR. Nothing to worry about! 🙂
Best wishes, Pete.
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Thanks for the heads up.
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No problem. It might well be nothing, but you never know.
Best wishes, Pete.
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That is why I am learning Ethical Hacking for safety 😁😁
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Thanks for the tip, Anubhav.
Best wishes, Pete.
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I wish them luck on finding my password, I have to look it up every tme I use it, But then rude postings from me may not be a giveaway 🙂 Thanks for the heads up, Warmest regards, Ed
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I know what you mean, Theo. I have my passwords automatically saved, by Google Chrome. So they don’t even have to enter them, if they get into my login.
Best wishes, Pete.
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Thanks for the heads up Pete. Gonna check mine!
Besties.
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Can’t hurt, Frank. It may be nothing, but you can never be sure.
Best wishes, Pete.
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Thanks for the heads up Pete. I’ve looked at some of those ‘click’ stats but have never been sure what they tell me. I’ll pay more attention now. I did change my password not too long ago for some other concern I had and thought the process was rather hokey. Most sites will have you enter a new password, once, then again to confirm it before changing and saving. WP only asked for it once, which means you have to be sure you entered it correctly the first time and exactly what you wrote down. I didn’t set up the 2 factor authentication as it seemed it would be such a hassle. I still may do it as there’s so many things to be on guard against these days. Such is the internet! 😉
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Thanks, Susanne. I have yet to tighten my security on WP. I thought they had t sorted, but now I have mild concerns.
Best wishes, Pete.
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thank you Pete! i never check my stats but i just did now. 🙂
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It is always worth a quick check, Wilma. Just in case!
Best wishes, Pete.
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Thanks for the heads up Pete!
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No problem, John.
Best wishes, Pete.
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Two factor authentication is the best method to protect yourself. I use LastPass Authenticator that gets backed up to LastPass so I don’t have to reset them if I reset or upgrade mobile phones. I always turn on 2FA if it’s available.
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Thanks, Andrew.
Best wishes, Pete.
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Side note, I moved back to WordPress hosting and lost all my followers. Will need to refollow if you previously followed.
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I had no idea… whenever I happen upon the stats page I have no idea how I found it and did not realize you can see how many clicks happen on the page. Isn’t there a way to contact WordPress about your suspicion?
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I just checked. It’s not that hard, I have a poor memory. And so few clicks I wouldn’t be able to tell if it’s inconsistent.
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I could try the help pages, but I am just going to keep an eye on it for now.
Best wishes, Pete.
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I think your followers would know something was off if your content took a drastic turn, that it was not you!
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I hope so! 🙂
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Thanks for the warning, Pete. I so rarely check my stats I’d probably never know if my blog had been hacked.
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It might only be a mistake, Mary. But it has just started to happen, and more than once. So it seemed suspicious because of that. 🙂
Best wishes.
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Thanks, Pete, this is useful information. I have a lot of spam on my paid site which drives me mad.
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I have also had a ‘Spam Avalanche’ lately, Robbie. More so since I upgraded! Up to 30 spams a day, mostly stopped by WP, luckily.
Best wishes, Pete.
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It is strange, isn’t it. When you pay more you attract more spam.
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I presume they go after the people they think will pay for their junk! 🙂
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Where there’s brass, there’s muck. 🙂
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Very true, BF.
Best wishes, Pete
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This is good information to know, thank you.
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Thanks, Kathy. Probably nothing, but it doesn’t hurt to check.
Best wishes, Pete.
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Maybe it’s those former Communists, the Russians. 🙂 I have to presume God at least sometimes smiles on the KG used-to-be. 🙂
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If the Russians want my info, Doug, I will happily just send them an email. 🙂 🙂
Best wishes, Pete.
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Set up two factor authentication to give yourself some peace of mind.
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Thanks for the tip. Have you changed your photo? 🙂
Best wishes, Pete.
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I did lol ☺
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I still guessed it was you! 🙂
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Reblogged this on Campbells World.
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Reblogged this on Ann Writes Inspiration.
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THANKS FOR THE TIMELY WARNING, PETE. WE ARE LIVING IN SOME TREACHEROUS TIMES FOR SURE.
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It may be nothing, John. But surely better to be aware my friend. 🙂
Best wishes, Pete.
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Reblogged this on theshammuramat.
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Many thanks, Felicity. x
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No problem!
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Thank you for the head’s up!
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Thanks for reading, Penny. It might be worth checking your stats now and again. 🙂
Best wishes, Pete.
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I just did AND I changed my password. Thank you!
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