WordFence plugin disappears

  • On two sites that are both in “coming soon” mode WordFence has been uninstalled. The error is this:
    The plugin wordfence/wordfence.php has been deactivated due to an error: Plugin file does not exist.

    Both sites are GoDaddy managed WordPress sites and both have automatic updates for WordFence. One of them I just noticed because I haven’t looked at it since February (that was the last scan). Luckily there was nothing there so nothing to hack although I’m running a scan.

    One more thing in common – both sites had DNS records changed, presumably by GoDaddy since there doesn’t seem to be anything wrong or added users.
    Your DNS records have changed
    Old DNS records: tuggbuddy.com points to 184.168.47.225
    New DNS records: tuggbuddy.com points to 198.12.145.239
    Severity: Warning
    Status New

    Could this be why WordFence was uninstalled – the DNS change? This is more something that I think you should know about – as I said it really wasn’t a problem to just reinstall the plugin.

    https://www.ads-software.com/plugins/wordfence/

Viewing 8 replies - 1 through 8 (of 8 total)

  • Hello asaracena,
    I don’t think the DNS changes are related to Wordfence being deactivated. That a reinstall worked indicates that some of your files had indeed gone missing. How they went missing I can’t tell you. Perhaps GoDaddy might have some answers.

    Thread Starter asaracena

    (@asaracena)

    Hi wfasa – asking GoDaddy anything usually involves too much time and rarely any satisfactory answers.

    The whole plugin folder is deleted when this happens, not just a few files. Same thing happened to one of my other sites a year ago (and it was happening to other people also as there was a thread on a post about the same issue). The options are still there because as a member of your support told me last time, those are stored in the DB.

    Hasn’t happened to any other plugins so I thought it might be a WordFence problem.

    If you don’t think the DNS changes are related then let’s mark this resolved. As I said, the plugin is easily re-installed. Thanks for getting back to me so quickly.

    Hello asaracena,
    thanks for the additional information. I’ll file this as a follow up and try to locate that old thread when I get a chance and see if I can come up with something. If so, I’ll let you know.

    Same issue. Updated wordpress and the plug-in is gone. Most of the files were still there when I look with FTP. I added a copy of the old index.php and wordfence.php files from the backup. It then would allow me to update through the wordpress dashboard. Doesn’t solve the ‘why’ though.

    One more thing to check. I just found that there was en entire copy of my whole site on the server. When I accessed via FTP there was a copy of the site created on the same day that wordfence went down. The copy was called mysitename.com.old – only I didn’t do it. The extra wordfence files were in the “old” folder but were not copied onto the “new” site folder. I have no idea why this would happen. I’ve contacted my host about it.

    Final update. The host updated their server. When the did, they duplicated the site, but two wordfence files didn’t copy over and (this time) the old version wasn’t deleted. Server update caused the issue.

    Hello tsturgell,
    Sounds like they were using some list to determine which files to include in the copy and for some reason the list did not include some essential Wordfence files. Many thanks for sharing your explanation here.

    Thread Starter asaracena

    (@asaracena)

    Same thing just happened for the second time to one of my sites. No notice of change of DNS this time so that’s not the issue. Here’s what happens:

    • Plugin is missing from plugin page in WP admin
    • Error message (The plugin wordfence/wordfence.php has been deactivated due to an error: Plugin file does not exist.)
    • Check in FTP and folder is completely gone

    This time I’ve put in a support ticket to GoDaddy. Will let you know if they figure out what is happening.

Viewing 8 replies - 1 through 8 (of 8 total)
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