Is your website secure on a shared server?

Security aspects of a shared web hosting server have always on the forefront. And, with almost 90% of websites being hosted on shared servers, the security considerations are not uncalled for.

Also know as virtual hosting, shared hosting has been the favorite of small and medium size enterprises. Owing to the fact that shared web hosting works out to be cheaper than hosting on dedicated servers. That’s because a website shares a server with other websites in a virtual environment.

But, does that make it vulnerable to hacking? That’s the million dollar question.

To understand the security aspects of hosting on shared servers, we will have to first understand the different modes of shared hosting.

Types of shared hosting

Domain based shared hosting:
It works on the Virtual Private Server (VPS) technology and provides each website with a unique URL, even though they are hosted on a single server. The VPS technology achieves by creating effective partitions in the server and gets them to act as individual servers.

Name based shared hosting:
In name based shared hosting, a websites name appears as a subset of the service providers name. Example of such service providers are geocities, blogspot etc.

Directory based shared hosting:
With respect to directory based shared hosting, the customers website will be mentioned as a directory in the host domain name.

The most important point that comes through with shared hosting is the relative lack of a dedicated IP address. That’s because most of the web security apparatus are applicable on the IP address level. That’s the reason why, dedicated severs are capable of providing a more secure environment; as they guarantee a unique IP address.

The other blockade with shared server security is the relative difficulty encountered in implementing SSL certificates.