PHP versions 7.4.29 and 8.0.18

The PHP developers recently released versions 7.4.29 and 8.0.18 that fix several bugs. We’ve upgraded the PHP 7.4 and 8.0 series on our servers as a result.

These changes should not be noticeable, but as always, don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any trouble.

PHP version 8.0.17

The PHP developers recently released version 8.0.17 that fixes several bugs. We’ve upgraded the PHP 8.0 series on our servers as a result.

This change should not be noticeable, but as always, don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any trouble.

Our servers are not vulnerable to the March 2022 “Dirty Pipe” security bug

Customers have asked us whether our servers are vulnerable to the recent serious security bug CVE-2022-0847 (nicknamed “Dirty Pipe”) in the Linux kernel software (explained in more technical detail here).

The good news is that we don’t use the vulnerable versions of the kernel software on our servers, and we’ve verified in multiple ways that our servers are not vulnerable to this problem.

PHP versions 7.4.28 and 8.0.16

The PHP developers recently released versions 7.4.28 and 8.0.16 that fix several bugs. We’ve upgraded the PHP 7.4 and 8.0 series on our servers as a result.

These changes should not be noticeable, but as always, don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any trouble.

PHP versions 7.4.27 and 8.0.14

The PHP developers recently released versions 7.4.27 and 8.0.14 that fix several bugs. We’ve upgraded the PHP 7.4 and 8.0 series on our servers as a result.

These changes should not be noticeable, but as always, don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any trouble.

Protection against setting the WordPress default “role” to “Administrator”

If you use WordPress, and you allow strangers to register for WordPress accounts (which isn’t usually a good idea, but some plugins require it), it’s possible to accidentally configure it so that those new users get created as WordPress administrators. That can happen simply by doing this:

Allowing this is a serious flaw that was supposed to be fixed in WordPress itself some time ago, but the problem still exists.

We don’t think it’s reasonable to ever create new users as “Administrators” by default, regardless of whether you have “anyone can register” turned on. (Even if “anyone can register” is turned off now, it would be easy to turn it on later without remembering to change the default role back.)

To make sure our customers’ sites stay secure, we’ve added some protections against this:

  • Setting the “New User Default Role” to “Administrator” is blocked at the Web Application Firewall (mod_security) level on our servers, whether from the WordPress dashboard or from any other web request;
  • If it somehow gets set anyway, our security systems will detect it as part of the daily security scan we do of every site;
  • If your site already had this setting as of today, we’ve restored it to the default “Subscriber” role.

Nobody should notice any changes as a result of this, but as always, don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any questions or difficulties.

Our servers are not vulnerable to the December 2021 Log4Shell / Log4j security bug

Customers have asked us whether our servers are vulnerable to the recent serious security bug (called “Log4Shell”) in software named “Log4j”.

The good news is that we don’t use the Log4j software anywhere on our servers, and never have. We’ve verified in multiple ways that our servers are not vulnerable to this problem.

That said, we always believe in “defense in depth” when it comes to security, so we’ve also added rules to our web application firewall that will block any IP addresses making attempts to exploit this bug.

PHP versions 7.4.26 and 8.0.13

The PHP developers recently released versions 7.4.26 and 8.0.13 that fix several bugs. We’ve upgraded the PHP 7.4 and 8.0 series on our servers as a result.

These changes should not be noticeable, but as always, don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any trouble.

PHP version 7.3.33

The PHP developers recently released version 7.3.33 that fixes a security bug. We’ve upgraded the PHP 7.3 series on our servers as a result.

This change should not be noticeable, but as always, don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any trouble.

PHP versions 7.4.25 and 8.0.12

The PHP developers recently released versions 7.4.25 and 8.0.12 that fix several bugs. We’ve upgraded the PHP 7.4 and 8.0 series on our servers as a result.

These changes should not be noticeable, but as always, don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any trouble.