Is Your Website Suspended?
If you’ve landed on your website and see a message that says ‘This Account Has Been Suspended’ don’t panic. Well, I’m sure you will but let’s take a look at what you should do if your website has been suspended by your hosting company.
Why Is My Website Suspended
The first step is to contact your web hosting company. I’d recommend calling them and if that’s not possible try to submit a support ticket. There are a handful of reasons why your web host would suspend your account.
Reason 1: Billing Issue
First off It could be a billing issue which can be resolved fairly quickly by ensuring your invoices are all paid and up to date. Login to your web hosting companies client area and check your invoices to make sure everything is current. It could be something as simple as paying an invoice. In my experience if it’s billing related then once you pay your invoice your service will come back automatically within 5-7 minutes. If you’ve paid your overdue invoice and your website hasn’t come back online within 10 minutes then it’s best to contact your web host to see if they need to manually unsuspend your account.
Reason 2: Website Hacked
If your invoices are all paid then it could be that your website was hacked or compromised. This is the most common reason websites get suspended. If you use a popular open-source script like WordPress, Joomla or Drupal for example then you’re a big target for hackers. Hackers are always targeting people using these scripts because they are used by the masses and not everyone keeps their script, themes and plugins updated. When you have a website it’s your responsibility to keep things up to date. If you use WordPress then make sure you are using the latest version. If you have a specific theme you should periodically check to see if there is an update. The same goes with plugins for WordPress. When you login to your WordPress dashboard you can see if any plugins need to be updated an take action accordingly. I cannot stress enough how important it is to stay on top of updates. It’s almost guaranteed you will get hacked if you do nothing so be proactive and check for updates!
Reason 3: CPU or Memory Abuse
With most hosting companies using CloudLinux technology, CPU or memory usage is not that common anymore. That being said some web hosting companies will suspend your website if they consider your CPU or memory usage to be too high for their shared hosting servers. This type of suspension usually means that you’ve outgrown shared hosting and need to consider a VPS or dedicated server. Getting a VPS is probably the best option if you have outgrown shared hosting but talk to your web host first to see what they recommend based on your usage. Another possibility is that a plugin or PHP process on your website was not ending (looping process) and that caused your CPU or memory to spike. If this is the case then you can have your web host ‘kill’ the process and then disable that plugin or PHP file to get things back online and then you can investigate further. If your web hosting company does use CloudLinux technology then inside your control panel you should see an icon called ‘Resource Usage’. The Resource Usage icon will show you a daily breakdown of your websites CPU and Memory broken down hourly so you can see when it spiked. It will give you a rough idea of what the cause was but speaking with your host is your best bet before taking any action.
How To Get Your Website Unsuspended
The number one rule is not to be upset with your web host. Hosting companies don’t want to suspend your website and will only do so if you break their terms of service. Getting upset or yelling at your hosting company won’t help or bring your website online. Stay clam and talk to your web host to see what you need to do to get your website back online.
If your website was suspended due to a hack or exploit there are a few things you will need to do. First, ask your web host to quarantine your website files. This means they will put the files in a folder that is not publicly accessible. This allows you to access your files in order to clean up the exploit. Once they have quarantined your data then the next step is to download all of the files to your computer (make sure you have an active virus scanner on your computer just to be safe).
Next you’ll want to upload a clean copy of your website from a backup. This is the safest way to get your website online. Once you’ve uploaded your website then you’ll want to update your script, theme and any plugins immediately. After you’ve updated everything and are confident the site is clean contact your hosting company and let them know so they can bring the website back online.
Google Malware Solution
If your website was suspended because it had malware then there is a good chance you’ll see the following message when you go to your website. If you do see this message then check out the links below on this page to clean and remove malware from your website.
Links and Resources:
If you see the above warning it means that Google scanned your website and found malware. Here are a few useful links if you see the above message on your website.
Google Instructions To Fix and Remove Malware
Request a malware review from Google
Check if your website is down for everyone or just you
Free Microsoft Virus Scanner and Security Essentials (I use this and highly recommend it as it’s free)
When it comes to website security you need to be proactive and vigilant. Update scripts, themes and plugins at least once a month. Change your passwords every few months and always use strong passwords that contain at least one uppercase, lowercase, number and symbol. Scan your local computer often to make sure your computer is not infected with any malware or trojans. Owning a website requires upkeep and maintenance and as long as you keep things updated your site will be secure.
