How important is it to keep my website updated?

Posted by sbh-admin on 03 07 2015.

The short answer is: very!

Unfortunately, website updates tend to be one of the things that get neglected but they are essential for ensuring the safety and integrity of your website and should never be left on the back burner. It is important to remember that updates are, more often than not, released to resolve a newly discovered security flaw.

But what are the consequences?

So what are the consequences of not keeping up to date? If you do not regularly check for and perform updates to your websites plugins, themes and scripts then you could be leaving your site vulnerable to being hacked, defaced or even completely destroyed.

I don’t have time to update my website all the time? I’m very busy!

Content management systems (like WordPress, Drupal,Joomla) make it very easy and quick to update.

Firstly, some content management systems (CMS) do allow you to enable automatic updates, this is obviously preferential if you rarely login to the back end of your website.

Secondly, if you do sign into the back end of your website regularly, often CMS’ will show you popups when you login letting you know what needs to be updated. Alternatively, there will be an updates symbol which will be highlighted should you require any updates.

Thirdly, your CMS might offer you the option to receive emails when there is a new update available.

All CMS’ are different and so it would be worth asking your web developer or looking at the FAQs for information.