Imagine you’re sitting at home in the evening. Someone walks up to your door and tries the handle.

Once. Then a second time, and a third.

And this happens 68 times a day—even at night. That’s 2,123 times a month!

Sounds unsettling, doesn’t it?

This is exactly what daily life looks like for servers exposed to the Internet.

Over the course of a month, our web server was scanned more than 2,100 times by automated bots searching for potential entry points.

I often hear the argument: “But we don’t have anything important there.”
The problem is, attackers often don’t care who you are.
What they care about is whether you’ve left your door open.

In the logs, I observed, among other things: attempts to access:
“/wp-content/plugins/hellopress/wp_filemanager.php” — a path associated with WordPress.
Or “/adminer-4.7.6-en.php” — a database management tool.
And also: “/phpinfo01.php”, which can reveal a great deal of information about the server configuration.

There were also attempts to locate files such as:
👉 /goods.php
👉 /cloud.php
👉 /css.php
👉 /333.php

These names are characteristic of scans looking for webshells and backdoors.
In other words, sometimes a bot isn’t even looking for a way to break in.
It is checking whether someone else has already broken in and left a “backdoor” open.

Why take over a small business’s server?

Because such a server can be used for:
✅ sending spam,
✅ hosting phishing content,
✅ concealing the origin of further attacks,
✅ scanning other systems,
✅ serving as a launchpad for deeper penetration into a company’s infrastructure,
✅ cryptocurrency mining,
✅ operating as part of a botnet.

Therefore, instead of asking, “Why would anyone attack us specifically?” Let’s ask: “What happens when an automated program one day comes across an open door?”

Because if you have something exposed to the Internet, sooner or later, someone—or something—is going to pull that handle.