Although any virtualized server is not going to pose any risk to its physical server host, you need to make sure that the virtual server itself is secured against common malware and virus programs. This is crucial even though you are going to run a virtual machine on a temporary basis.

Important security steps for protection of VPS

Virtual Private Server is identical to a dedicated server in terms of its administrative tasks. A VPS demands your full attention for protecting it in order to explore its amazing advantages.

Usually, all Virtual Private Servers are provided with root accounts by service passwords. It is not necessary to access your Virtual Private Server every time by logging as root. Alternatively, one can escalate to root by creating a separate user account as and when required.

Security can be added by disabling root logins in SSH settings. Server’s security is most commonly compromised due to weak passwords. Therefore these need to be changed from time to time.  It is observed that FTP is one of the most common weak links because it is not secure. Instead of that, you can use SFTP or any other secure method to transfer files. By using an encrypted SSH login you can protect your mission-critical data or can also secure your password.

Backups are extremely necessary to make sure that no data is lost due to any unplanned event. Frequently automated and remote backups are significant for assured recovery of data in such situations. Since you are entirely responsible for the flawless functioning of your Virtual Private Server, you need to implement all critical tasks that need to keep it updated unless the provider has promised to perform security updates on user’s behalf.

Restriction of remote access

It is necessary to configure firewall rules in order to restrict remote access to your virtual private server. It is found that remote access is usually allowed to trust IPs of users and remote services including SSH and RDP. As regards others, you may block the access.

If by any chance you need to maintain accessibility from a mobile device or from home, then the same can be established by knowing IPs of the devices. Remote access is also needed to be kept open for technical support teams by knowing their IPs. It is always better to limit the number of attempts by defining these numbers as well as the time limit.

Importance of Passwords

Password security is probably the most vital parameter of protecting your Virtual Private Server Hosting. This should be applicable to your administrator as well as root users. According to a general understanding, a strong password consists of the variety of letters, digits, punctuation marks and so forth. In addition to the strength of password characters, one should not miss the required length of password du to assured security.

You need to understand that most of the brute force attackers will attempt to aim at core team of admin users by cycling through general words and then moving further to permutations and combinations of random words, letters, and characters.

It is possible to crack passwords with short length including passwords that contain ten or less numb of characters. If you want to enhance the security of passwords, then you need to have the password with more than ten characters.

Adding new users

You will be required to add new users to your system for its management unless you are the only user of the system in which case your name itself can be a perfect username. In the case of a user group, convention for usernames that is used in other places is an ideal alternative.

The remote desktop group can be accorded administrator access if you are using Windows operating system and in the case of Linux VPS, your users in a group can be added to sub-doers. Once you have accomplished the task of adding users to the system, you can log out and check if everything is working properly by logging again.

Need for securing Linux servers from hacking attempts

It is a fact that majority of public servers are run on Linux operating system and this exposes Linux servers to attacks from hackers. However, these threats can be kept at bay by ensuring proper precautions. These include keeping servers updated at any given time. This can be achieved by setting up Linux VPS server so that a notification is sent to you as and when the update is available. The fixes should be instantly applied if these are associated with bug fixing.

Since a good portion of server attacks uses the network, it is prudent to enforce robust network security by hardening various parameters of Linux kernel. It is also recommended to implement two-factor authentication for servers that are sensitive. 

Since most of the server attacks are preceded by malware uploading to servers, it is highly necessary to enable malware scanning for inward as well as outward traffic in order to thwart hacking attempts.