Google’s search results have a reputation for being bad these days and for good reason, they are bad. Take the results we got when doing a search for “best wordpress security plugins 2024”. We got this information directly on the search page, which lists the plugin Jetpack Security first:

The source for that is none other than Jetpack (which is part of Automattic), so not an unbiased source. The linked post doesn’t disclose that bias. It also isn’t the best security plugin.

While the source page is titled “The 12 Best WordPress Security Plugins in 2024”, it clearly is an old post with the year updated. The second plugin listed is iThemes Security, which is the old name of Solid Security, the name was changed in October. Another plugin listed, All in One WP Security and Firewall, is listed with a name it stopped using in October 2022. Another plugin listed isn’t even supported anymore and the link for it goes to a page with a page not found message.

Other information on the page is not helpful or accurate. The page repeatedly focuses on brute force attacks, which are not even happening. Despite those not happening, that is the first thing they focus on with Jetpack Security. As we noted recently, Solid Security is mainly focused on those non-existent brute force attacks, making it an odd choice to list second.

What is missing from the list are two of the best plugins. In our testing, the best free firewall plugin for WordPress is NinjaFirewall. It should get a lot more attention than it does, considering how much better it is than other free options. The list is also missing our own Plugin Vulnerabilities Firewall, which provides even more protection than NinjaFirewall.

Jetpack’s page doesn’t cite any testing results and was written by the “Marketing Lead for Jetpack,” so unlikely to be a reliable source for security information.

Google claims they focus EEAT when it comes to search results, which is short for experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness. It’s hard to look at what Jetpack is presenting and think that it would qualify for expertise, authoritativeness, or trustworthiness considering who the author is, the misleadingly dated information, and the lack of bias disclosure.

We also looked at another of the top results, which shares many of the same issues as Jetpack’s post, which we will cover in another post.