Securing an online store is a crucial task for every successful e-commerce business. That’s why Magento experts continually work on improving Magento security, to keep their store and customer data safe and protected.
However, don't hesitate to take extra security steps to strengthen your protection against threats. A common way is learning about the Magento Security Scan Tool — a powerful, free tool designed to help your store remain a safe place.
Today, you'll learn its key features, benefits, and why it's essential to use it to maintain the security of your store.
What is Magento 2 Security Scan?
Magento Security Scan Tool is a powerful service provided by Adobe whose task is to help store owners protect their businesses from various security risks, such as missing patches, malware, and unauthorised access.
No matter whether you are a Magento Open Source or Adobe Commerce user, this free tool helps identify security vulnerabilities and offers effective recommendations to protect your store.
How the Magento 2 Security Scan Tool Works?
Since Magento is a widely used platform, it's a common target for hackers. So, using the Magento Security Scan Tool allows you to be prepared for such attacks, since it:
Runs automated scans
The Magento security scanner regularly performs automated security checks. They run in the background without disrupting the system's performance or user experience. Plus, it sends a notification as soon as it detects anything, so that you can act quickly.
Conducts over 21,000 security tests
With this tool, Magento makes over 21,000 individual security tests to spot weak points in your store. This comprehensive testing helps reveal threats that may go undetected through manual checks.
Provides reports
After each test, the Magento security scanner generates detailed reports highlighting any identified issues. You can review not only real-time but also historical reports. This helps to monitor your store's security progress over time.
Gives recommendations
In addition to sending you scan reports, the Magento security check offers key recommendations on how to strengthen your store's security.
Informs about new patches and updates
The scanner notifies you whenever Magento releases any security patches or updates. This helps you stay up to date with the latest security opportunities and apply fixes before anything "bad" happens.
How to Use Magento Security Scan Tool?
If you are ready to check Magento security, it's time to get down to business and follow the steps below.
Step 1: Enable security scan in your Magento account
Sign in to your Magento 2 account, find the Security Scan section on the left side of the panel, and press the Go to Security Scan button.
After looking through the Terms and Conditions, press the Agree button.
Step 2: Prove domain ownership
To prove to Magento that you are authorised to scan and access the security data of the store, you need to verify your domain ownership.
First, click the +Add Site button to add the name and URL of the site you want to check.
Then specify the Site URL and Name, and press the Generate Confirmation Code button at the bottom of the page. Copy the confirmation code.
Step 3: Access Magento admin panel
Once your confirmation code is generated, you need to sign in to your Magento admin panel and go to Content > Design > Configurations. Here, find the site you want to check and press Edit.
Scroll down to the HTML Head section, paste the generated code into the Script and Style Sheets field, and save the changes.
Step 4: Verify the confirmation code
After saving the changes in the admin panel, go back to your Magento account page and press the Verify Confirmation Code button.
From now on, you can use the Magento security check to monitor your store, analyse security risks, and receive security notifications directly within your Magento account.
Step 5: Set the automatic security scan option
To save time and stay focused on your business, configure the automatic security scan option. It won't let you miss any possible threats.
Magento allows you to schedule regular security checks, either daily or weekly.
Daily scan
To apply an automatic daily security check, specify both the time and time zone in which the scan should run.
By default, the security checks start at midnight. However, you may want to schedule it just before working hours. So, you can avoid disruption during peak hours and take immediate action once any risks are detected.
The Magento security scan completes within a few minutes. However, the exact duration can differ depending on the size and complexity of your store, server response time, and the current scan queue on Adobe’s side.
Weekly scan
For more efficient results, Magento suggests scanning your site weekly. It allows you to maintain consistent security coverage, since daily scans may generate frequent repetitive alerts.
In this case, weekly reports help the team to focus on what's changed and take action without being overwhelmed. If you choose to set a weekly test using this security scanner, specify the day of the week, time zone, and the exact time of the scan.
Step 6: Confirm emails for reports and updates
When you first set up the Magento security check, you need to specify your email address and don't forget to Submit your website for scanning. That's the address where all your security reports and notifications will be sent to.
Regularly check your inbox for security scan results and updates. In case of any vulnerabilities, act on the recommendations to quickly reduce potential risks.
Step 7: Run the security scan and review the report
Now, if you decide to perform the first scan manually rather than wait for the scheduled security check, go to System > Security, choose Magento Security Scan from the available options, and press the Run Scan button.
You'll see the reports in three tables: successful scans, unidentified scans, and failed scans. The results and recommendations will be available right after the security check is complete, directly on the scan results page in your account or via email.
Tips for Using Magento Security Scan Tool
It's important to understand what role the Magento security scanner plays in your chosen security strategy if you want to use it effectively.
This free tool covers a lot of security problems. However, it matters how you respond to the scan results.
Below are the key tips you should take into consideration while using the tool:
- Ensure the validity of all your domains: hackers can target not only live sites, but also staging and development projects. By checking them too, you may avoid any weak points for attacks.
- Scan regularly: in spite of running weekly scans, use the tool after any major updates and installation of third-party extensions.
- Review scan results: pay close attention to Unidentified and Failed Scans, as they may indicate potential vulnerabilities.
- Act quickly: fix serious reported issues immediately to minimise any risks. Don't ignore small issues: at first glance, some problems may seem unimportant, however, they may turn into serious security risks in the future.
- Activate email notifications: enable email notifications to receive clear updates about your Magento security at once, to eliminate the issues as soon as possible.
- Work with trusted and experienced developers: any security fixes may result in some changes to server configurations, core files, or patches. So, it's important to involve qualified and trusted developers to handle these tasks.
Strengthening Magento Store Security: Best Practices
The Magento Security Scan tool is a helpful resource for dealing with vulnerabilities and helping you take proactive measures to protect your data.
However, don't miss other available opportunities to secure your store — every extra layer of protection counts.
- Use security extensions: strengthen your store with the , which offers not only security scans and compliance checks, but also internal, real-time protection and admin control features.
- Keep Magento and extensions up to date: since outdated software is a common target for hacker attacks, one of the most effective ways to protect your Magento store is keeping it updated.
- Manage access levels with user roles: configure admin security options to assign specific roles to different users and avoid any chances of malicious changes in your backend.
- Enable Google reCaptcha for your store: enable Google reCaptcha to protect your store's forms from automated attacks (bots and spam).
Regular system scans, applying the best practices, and updating Magento regularly are crucial for minimising security risks.
Magento Security Checker is a great way to start. However, it tends to miss some crucial points, like malware in the file system and database. Be open to third-party options if you want more advanced reporting.
