WordPress has both free and premium themes which are the most beautiful themes of content management systems available on internet right now. Almost all newbie bloggers go for free themes as they have no money to pay for premium themes. But choosing free theme is not an easy thing to do as there are tons of free themes websites to choose from and astonishingly more than 90% free themes websites contain some malicious code free themes. This malicious code can be used for DDOS attacks on other websites and some may be spreading spam links all over the internet. So how do you judge that the free theme you are using is 100% safe.
One main thing you should always keep in mind that never choose free theme from unknown or unpopular website. Always first check for WordPress official free themes directory and if some how you will not find your desired theme than only visit the most popular free WordPress themes.
Also Read: 7 Essential WordPress Security Tips
How to Check your Free Theme for Malicious Code?
WordPress has 3 main plugins mention below which can be used to check your free theme for malicious code. These plugin works by checking each and every file in your free theme and if they found some thing alarming than they will notify you about malicious code.
1. WordPress Exploit Scanner:
The best WordPress free plugin to check the credibility of free theme and to check the security loop whole in your website. It searches all the files present in your website including theme, Plugins, comments and posts database. Its also smart enough to check your active plugins for unusual activity and file names.
2. TAC (Theme Authenticity Checker):
Another great free plugin to check your theme for unwanted code and that is TAC or Theme Authenticity Checker. This plugin works by searching and scanning each and every file present in your theme and look for any unwanted code. This plugin is a must for every blogger how is using free theme otherwise you may be spreading spam on internet and search engines might penalize you on this behavior.
3. WordPress Antivirus:
Yes antivirus for your WordPress blog like your computer. Its also great free plugin and scan your blog themes files for malicious code. Its specially design to detect a serious security loop whole in WordPress named as permalink back door which is a very famous malicious malware ever detected in WordPress blogs. This plugin will highlight the suspicious code in green color if found in your blog theme.
Thanks for these tips. Newbie bloggers should take care of these things and be aware before choosing a theme from the web.
I have personally used the TAC plugin. It’s good! Currently I’m using the Genesis Framework for my blog.
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At first i was using free theme and one of my friend told me that his antivirus has blocked your blog. Than i search for some malicious code and found that cod was in my blog free theme. After that i decided to use premium theme.
Wow! I never heard about these plugins. Seems nice to check the authenticity. Thanks buddy.
Puneet these plugins are must for every blogger specially if you are using free theme.
Thats right Zeeshan. Thank you so much again for these plugins. I also loved the logo of your blog.
Thanks Puneet for appreciating.