Sucuri reported on their blog yesterday that the WordPress Social Media Widget plugin is injecting payday loan spam into websites. It is recommended that you remove the plugin from your WordPress site.
How to Remove The Social Media Widget Plugin
Apologies for the poor sound, I still have not replaced my Muppet chewed headset! Written instructions are below the video.
To save time later, if you do not have a record of your social links then copy them into a notepad file or spreadsheet now.
- Click on Appearance > Widgets on the left menu in your WordPress dashboard
- On the right side, locate where you have the Social Media Widget placed and open the widget
- Scroll through each section and copy your social URLs onto a notepad file
Once you have all your data saved, now you can delete the plugin.
- Click on Plugins in the left menu of your WordPress dashboard
- Scroll down to the Social Media Widget and click deactivate
- Once the plugin has been deactivated, scroll down again and click delete
- Click the “yes, delete these files” button
Social Media Widget Alternatives
There are many social plugins available. To save searching, I’ve listed 3 here:
Social Share Toolkit (adds share buttons as well as follow buttons)
Over to you…
Do you use the Social Media Widget plugin? What plugin will you replace it with?
Update: The issues with this plugin have been resolved and once again it is available via your WordPress dashboard or http://wordpress.org/support/plugin/social-media-widget
WordPress Social Media Widget Plugin Spam Problems by Jan Kearney
Thanks for the information. I appreciate you looking out for us.
Jen
Hi Jen, you’re welcome – thanks for popping in 🙂
It’s bad enough we have to worry about viruses through email, now we have to watch out for plugins in WordPress?
Don’t people have anything better to do with their time?
Thanks for watching out for us Mum! 🙂
Need to keep on our toes, Bonnie!
If it makes you feel any better, we have to stay on our toes with any blogging platform/cms, but especially the ones that are extendable.
That’s true, Amanda – thanks for popping in 🙂
Thanks for the warning.
I found that my theme already had a widget to do this so I saved a plugin!
Joy
Some themes do have social following built in – it’s great you saved a search for a new plugin!
It seems everyday there are issues with spammers, hackers, and the like. I’m thankful for people out there who keep us updated and one foot in front of the bad guys.
Glad it was useful for you Shawn – thanks for popping in 🙂
I’m gad I’m not using this plugin! Thanks for bringing this information to everyone’s attention.
It was a great plugin and until now really stable. I hope the developers get this mess sorted! Thanks for popping in Toni 🙂
Hi Jan,
Found you on Joy Healey’s post. So I thought I’d follow your link. I’m glad I don’t have “Social Media Widget.” Whatever that means. I don’t even know what that’s for. So I must be okay, right?
Anyway, hope you have a great weekend.
Angela
Welcome Angela! Social Media Widget is a social plugin for WordPress. I just popped over to your site and it’s not there – so yes, you’re ok 🙂
Thanks for popping in, I look forward to seeing you again!