If a WordPress website has an administrator account with “admin” username, it is an open invitation for hackers. For the security of your estimable website, you must delete the unsecured administrator account.
How to create a new administrator account? How to delete an administrator account on a WordPress website safely? See, adding and removing administrator account on a WordPress website is a simple and straightforward process. You do not need to be a skilled developer for doing that. Follow the article you would able to obstruct the vulnerability in the administrator account of your website and secure it today in just a few minutes. Read also Get a Secure Reliable Email with Feature Advantage of Gmail.
Create New Administrator and Delete Old Administrator Account in Six Easy Steps
Step One: Full Backup | Access to your website is the most critical thing. Whenever you intend to alter login, access method, users' permission or anything that is related to access or login to your website, make sure you take a full back up.
Quick backup, light backup or something like that might get you in big trouble. Due to some error, it is entirely possible you might be denied access to the website.
Most of the issues on an active WordPress website have an easy fix, but when there are issues with login, the only solution you would have is to contact an experienced WordPress administrator. Therefore, think many times before you decide to play with the access/login settings of your website. Once again I insist on making a full back up of your asset, your hard work, your valuable website.
Step Two: Create a New user: The new user is going to be the next administrator account on your website. So carefully decide the username. Make sure it is not less than 11 digits and have a combination of letters and numbers. Make sure you bless this administrator account with a secure password, impossible to guess by hackers' bot. Also, ensure you have saved the password on a notepad file and securely stored it on your computer at a safe place, which is not accessible easily.
Step Three: Give this new user all the administrator power and hit the create button to make it active. On your website now have two administrators.
Step Four: Log out and log in to the website once again but this time with the newly created administrator username and password. Check everything working fine.
- Check can you add and update the plugins
- Can you access to CSS file of the active theme
- Change the font size in the main CSS file of an inactive theme
- Make some changes in one of the posts
- Approve pending comments.
Is everything working as usual? Are you fully assured that the new administrator account is functionally same as the old administrator account? If your answer is yes, you can proceed to demote the old administrator account to just a contributor.
Step Five: Click on the edit link associated with the old administrator account. Remove its administrator privilege and make it just a contributor. Now log out.
Step Six: Login again to your website, see whether everything still working okay or not. Now proceed to delete the old insecure administrator account.
Secure Administrator Account on Your WordPress Website
If you follow these six steps, I am sure you would be able to remove the unsecured administrator account from your WordPress website safely. With the new administrator account at the helm, which has a hard to guess username and undoubtedly a hard to guess password your WordPress website is now more secure.
See, not every website has the same settings from the server to the website root. How a WordPress website would respond to critical alterations depends on several factors. Shortcuts may work for one site and very likely may not work on another website. Therefore, it is essential that carefully inspect at every step while doing something extraordinary like the one you just did or going to do — deleting an administrator account. I insist following all the six steps mentioned above.
I do not know what the level of your expertise in doing such things is. As a guide, I need to care about everyone that includes novice to expert website administrators. That is why there are six steps instead of just two. Therefore, I insist once again follow the steps and secure your valuable WordPress website from hackers' bots now.