BBQ Firewall – Fast & Powerful Firewall Security vs Shield Security – Smart Bot Blocking, Brute-Force Login Protection & File Scanning

🔥 Install, activate, and done! 🔥 Powerful protection from WP’s fastest firewall plugin. BBQ Firewall is a lightweight, blazing-fast firewall plugin that protects your site against a wide range of threats. BBQ checks all incoming traffic and quietly blocks bad requests containing nasty stuff like eval(, base64_, and excessively long request-strings. This is a simple yet solid solution for sites that are unable to use a strong Apache/.htaccess firewall. 🔥 Adds a strong firewall to ANY WordPress site 🔥 Works with all WordPress plugins and themes Powerful Protection BBQ protects your site against many threats: SQL injection attacks Executable file uploads Directory traversal attacks Unsafe character requests Excessively long requests PHP remote/file execution XSS, XXE, and related attacks Protects against bad bots Protects against bad referrers Protects against bad POST content Protects against many other bad requests 🔥 Works great with Blackhole for Bad Bots and Banhammer Awesome Features BBQ provides all the best firewall features: Rated 5 stars at WordPress.org 100% plug-&-play, zero configuration 100% focused on security and performance Blocks a wide range of malicious URL requests Fastest Web Application Firewall (WAF) for WordPress Based on the 7G/8G Firewall Scans all incoming traffic and blocks bad requests Scans all types of requests: GET, POST, PUT, DELETE, etc. Protects against known bad bots and referrers Works silently behind the scenes to protect your site Hassle-free security plugin that’s easy to use Thoroughly tested, error-free performance Extremely low rate of false positives Compatible with other security plugins Regularly updated and “future proof” Firewall < 10 kilobytes in size Lightweight, fast and flexible 🔥 For advanced protection and features, check out BBQ Pro &raquo; Exclusive Pro Features Customize firewall via plugin settings Easily add or remove firewall patterns Easily add Jeff Starr’s AI Block List Send Email Alerts for blocked requests Quickly enable/disable firewall rules Disable firewall for logged-in users Block excessively long URI requests Protect against XML-RPC exploits Block any individual IP address Block entire ranges of IP addresses Protect against user-ID phishing Redirect all blocked requests Display a custom “blocked” message Set your own response status code Complete inline documentation Statistics for blocked requests Tools to reset options and patterns Import and Export firewall patterns One-click pattern testing Whitelist IP addresses ..plus everything the free version can do and more. 🔥 Learn more and get BBQ Pro &raquo; Privacy This plugin does not collect or store any user data. It does not set any cookies, and it does not connect to any third-party locations. Thus, this plugin does not affect user privacy in any way. BBQ Firewall is developed and maintained by Jeff Starr, 15-year WordPress developer and book author. 🔥 BBQ = Block Bad Queries Support development I develop and maintain this free plugin with love for the WordPress community. To show support, you can make a donation or purchase one of my books: The Tao of WordPress Digging into WordPress .htaccess made easy WordPress Themes In Depth Wizard’s SQL Recipes for WordPress And/or purchase one of my premium WordPress plugins: BBQ Pro – Blazing fast WordPress firewall Blackhole Pro – Automatically block bad bots Banhammer Pro – Monitor traffic and ban the bad guys GA Google Analytics Pro – Connect WordPress to Google Analytics Head Meta Pro – Ultimate Meta Tags for WordPress REST Pro Tools – Awesome tools for managing the WP REST API Simple Ajax Chat Pro – Unlimited chat rooms USP Pro – Unlimited front-end forms Links, tweets and likes also appreciated. Thank you! 🙂

Most security plugins hand you a dashboard full of alerts and expect you to know what to do next. Shield works differently. It blocks threats automatically, repairs what it can on its own, and then shows you exactly what still needs your attention — ranked by impact, not volume. Less noise. More action. 🤖 Security That Runs Itself The most powerful thing Shield does is what it handles without you: Automatic IP Blocking — every visitor is quietly scored as they interact with your site. Failed logins, firewall blocks, silentCAPTCHA failures, and other signals accumulate into a reputation score. When a visitor’s score crosses the threshold, Shield blocks them — automatically, without you lifting a finger Automatic File Repair — when a file integrity scan finds a changed WordPress core file, Shield pulls the original from WordPress.org and restores it. Detected and fixed, without waiting for you to act Automatic Bot Recognition — Shield identifies legitimate crawlers (Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, Yandex, Apple) and known services (ManageWP, Pingdom, Stripe, CloudFlare) and never blocks them. Your SEO and monitoring tools keep working 🧭 Guided Security, Not Just a Dashboard Shield organises your security into four focused areas so you always know where to look: Queue — things that need your attention, ranked by priority. Not everything at once — just what matters right now Investigate — dig into blocked IPs, security events, and the specific signals that triggered each one Configure — guided setup for each protection area, with clear recommendations matched to your site Reports — a clear view of what Shield has blocked, detected, and repaired over time The goal: guide you quickly towards action, not bury you in data. 🛡️ Free Protection Bot Blocking & Firewall silentCAPTCHA — blocks bad bots on login, registration, lost password, and comment forms using passive signals invisible to real visitors. No CAPTCHA keys. No external requests. No JavaScript that breaks your forms. Everything runs on your server (GDPR friendly). Firewall rules blocking common WordPress attack patterns — SQL injection probes, known exploit signatures, suspicious request parameters XML-RPC protection — disable or restrict entirely, including pingbacks and trackbacks REST API firewall — block unauthenticated requests Fake crawler detection — identifies bots spoofing legitimate search engines Login & Account Security Two-factor authentication (2FA) — email codes, Google Authenticator, or YubiKey OTP for all users Brute force protection with configurable login attempt limits and cooldown Session locking — tie sessions to a browser or IP to stop account theft after a successful login User enumeration blocking — closes off ?author= probes used to harvest usernames before an attack Scanning & Integrity Core file scanning — compares WordPress core against official checksums and repairs changed files automatically Suspicious PHP detection — flags PHP files in locations where they have no business being Abandoned plugin detection — identifies unmaintained plugins most likely to carry unpatched vulnerabilities Visibility & Control Security Admin PIN — lock Shield’s own settings so other administrators cannot quietly weaken your configuration Security activity log — logins, user changes, plugin and theme events, post edits, and suspicious requests: Everything in one clear view IP Rules — automatic & manual block and bypass rules, CIDR range support, full per-IP request history 🤝 CrowdSec Integration Shield is the only WordPress security plugin with a native CrowdSec integration. CrowdSec aggregates threat signals from millions of sites into a shared IP reputation network — your site blocks known attackers before they ever probe you, using intelligence far beyond your own traffic history. ✨ ShieldPRO Passkeys — phishing-resistant, passwordless login for users Backup login codes — emergency 2FA access when a device is lost AI-based malware scanner — detects known and unknown PHP malware Plugin & theme file scanning — compares installed files against WordPress.org originals, flagging unauthorised changes Vulnerability scanning — active checks across all installed plugins and themes Broader spam protection — WooCommerce, EDD, Contact Form 7, Ninja Forms, Elementor, and more Traffic rate limiting — cap request rates per IP to absorb high-volume bot floods User suspension — manual or automatic suspension of idle accounts MainWP integration White Label — rename and rebrand Shield for client sites Who It’s For Shield suits site owners, agencies, and MSPs who want protection that runs itself — not a plugin that demands constant attention to be useful. If you have been burned by security plugins that generate more noise than protection, or dashboards that tell you everything is wrong without telling you what to fix, Shield was built to be the alternative.