I’ve been a user of Shield Security for a number of years, both the Pro and the Free versions. It’s become my go-to and my recommended WP Security plugin.

It has a number of killer features that beat out much of the competition — like being able to lockdown the plugin itself from changes with an additional password, and being able to lock down certain features within WP like installing/deleting/updating plugins/themes/etc (and those settings are very granular, for example you can block installing and deleting, but allow updating).

This is great for when you want or need to give access to other admins to a site, but you don’t want them to screw up security.

It’s known as “separation of privileges”, or “just in time administration” or “elevated privilege sessions” within security. Meaning that you don’t log into WP with all of your admin rights, and you have to “elevate” with the additional password to unlock the plugin/additional WP features.

For those of you used to Windows/Mac OS, this is like not using your admin account all the time, or when you do, having to click the extra button to agree to allow admin functions (and sometimes re-entering your password to do so). For those of you used to Linux/*nix systems, it’s like having to use sudo to allow admin functions.

All the other features you’d expect (IP blocking/firewall/malware scanning/etc – I won’t run through everything, I’ll let you check out the feature set yourself!) are there. Again, more comprehensively than a lot of other plugins.

There’s an active FB community too, where Shield staff contribute daily to provide support alongside other community members, and the Shield team seem absolutely committed to developing this plugin. I’ve seen it grow from strength to strength both with great ideas from the team themselves, but also from user and customer feedback.

The acid test, too… I’ve been able to protect many sites… A lot with automated interventions by Shield, but also by manually reviewing things like traffic logs right within the plugin, and blocking threats.

The final thing to mention is that it’s a lot more lightweight and efficient than other security plugins I’ve used!