This is my very first post on my new website, and I want to share some lessons I’ve already learned the hard way about website security. I purchased my domain last month; and, though it took me a while to choose, I settled on DreamHost to host my site a little over a week ago now.

Last Friday night, I tried to take a look at this site – not because I had done too much with it yet, but just because I was happy with the way it was taking shape. I had installed my WordPress.org content management system, and I had loaded my lovely website theme onto the site earlier in the week. That night however, I was stunned to find that when I typed in www.techkathy.com, my site no longer loaded. Instead, I was rerouted to some German guy’s website devoted to new developments for the iPhone.

I was shocked, upset, angry and confused, all at the same time, but I slowly pulled myself together to take action. Unfortunately, since this is my first website, I wasn’t exactly sure what that action should be. I struggled for the next four hours to figure out how this had happened and what I could do about it.

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