Brute force attacks against XML-RPC are one of the oldest and most common types of attacks to your site. Recently, according to Sucuri’s post above, attackers have found a way to “amplify” these attacks – making it easier for attackers to try and break into your site.
How can you protect yourself from brute force attacks?
Simple. Use Jetpack’s Brute force protection module.
Sam Hotchkiss, one of our Jetpack developers, wrote an article today on his blog going over the more technical details on how this new attack method works and how Jetpack protects you from this new threat.
If you’re running Jetpack with brute force protection enabled, you don’t need to do anything to keep yourself safe from this. We’ve already got it taken care of for you!
Jetpack 
Do we have “protect” enabled on our Jetpack? Check out the following message…
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Your message didn’t come through, but you can check to see if Protect is enabled by ensuring that Jetpack is connected to your WordPress.com user account, then check under Jetpack -> Settings and scroll down to see if Protect is activated. If so, you’re all set!
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Reblogged this on Sam Hotchkiss.
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Awesome! My site has been a target of such attacks. Do we need the latest version of Jetpack for this to be enabled?
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While we strongly encourage that you keep WordPress install, your themes, and your plugins up-to-date by using the most recent version – as long as you’re using Jetpack 3.4 or above, you should be covered for this specific vulnerability.
We have made other security improvements to Jetpack since we introduced Protect, so I highly recommend you update to the most recent version of Jetpack to ensure you’re fully protected.
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