How to Secure Your WordPress Login With One Time Password

If you have a little sense of security, you will know that it is totally unsafe to login to any of your private account, be it email, bank, or your WordPress site, in a public unsecured network (a.k.a free wifi). Many hackers are hanging around in the open network looking for opportunity to obtain your login credential and wreak havoc with it.

Much as we like to prevent, there will be situations (for example, when we are travelling) where we need to access our WordPress account via a public network. Luckily, we can add extra protection layer to our WordPress account so that when such situations occur, we can be sure that we are safe from hackers' clutches.

As its name implies, One Time Password allows you to use a one-time password to login to your WP account. Once that password is used, it won't be valid for subsequent login. Even when hackers get hold of your login password, they won't be able to login to your site.

Usage

Setting up One-Time Password is easy.

1. Install and activate the OneTime Plugin in your WordPress account.

2. Go to Settings -> One Time Password.

3. Enter a passphrase (make sure that this passphrase is not your login password).



4. Click the Generate button. You should see a list of generated password.



5. Print out the generated password and bring it with you every time you need to access your account from a public terminal.

Login with one-time password

Now, go to the wp-login.php page and enter your login name in the Username field. You should see a new line of code appear under the password field.



Take note of the two digits number and tally that with your generated password list.



Enter the one time password, including the space in between the words.

That's it. You will now be logged into your account. The password you have just entered will become invalid.

What other ways do you use to protect your blog?

Image credit: Darwin Bell