Jeffrey Costa

Clean .htaccess Tool is a powerful WordPress plugin designed to help you maintain a clean and efficient .htaccess file. It scans your .htaccess file for entries from deactivated or uninstalled plugins and allows you to safely remove them, enhancing your site’s security and performance.
Key features: 
* Automatic detection of unused .htaccess entries 
* User-friendly interface for reviewing and cleaning the .htaccess file 
* Backup creation before making any changes 
* Detailed diff view to see exactly what will be removed
Whether you’re a WordPress administrator looking to optimize your site’s performance or a developer cleaning up after testing multiple plugins, Clean .htaccess Tool simplifies the process of maintaining a lean and secure .htaccess file.
<h4>Why Clean Your .htaccess File?</h4>
<ol>
<li>Improved Security: Remove potential security vulnerabilities left by old or unused plugins.</li>
<li>Better Performance: A streamlined .htaccess file can lead to faster page load times.</li>
<li>Easier Maintenance: Keep your server configuration clean and understandable.</li>
<li>Conflict Prevention: Eliminate conflicting rules that could cause unexpected behavior.</li>
</ol>
Clean .htaccess Tool makes these benefits accessible to WordPress users of all experience levels, providing a safe and easy way to optimize this critical server file.

Clean .htaccess Tool

Clean .htaccess Tool simplifies WordPress security and performance by safely removing unused entries from your .htaccess file.

Samuel Aguilera

There’s a lot of WordPress security plugins with many many options and pages to setup. And that is fine if you know what to do. 
But most of the times, you don’t need so much or simply you’re not sure about what to set or not.
This plugin adds some extra security to your WordPress with only one click. No options page, just activate it!
<h4>Features</h4>
Like many other security plugins SAR One Click Security adds well known .htaccess rules, but only the ones probed to be safe to use in almost any type of site (including WooCommerce stores), to protect your WordPress from common attacks. This allows you to have a safer WordPress without worries about what protection you should be using.
<ul>
<li>Turn off ServerSignature directive, that may leak information about your web server.</li>
<li>Turn off directory listing, avoiding bad configured hostings to leak your files.</li>
<li>Blocks public access (from web) to following files that may leak information about your WordPress install: .htaccess, license.txt, readme.html, wp-config.php, wp-config-sample.php, install.php</li>
<li>Blocks access to wp-login.php to dummy bots trying to register in WordPress sites that have registration disabled.</li>
<li>Blocks requests looking for timthumb.php, reducing server load caused by bots trying to find it. (*)</li>
<li>Blocks TRACE and TRACK request methods, preventing XST attacks.</li>
<li>Blocks direct posting to wp-comments-post.php (most spammers do this) and access with blank User Agent, reducing spam comments a lot and also server load.</li>
<li>Blocks direct access to PHP files in wp-content directory (this includes subdirectories like plugins or themes). Protecting you from a huge number of 0day exploits.</li>
<li>Blocks direct POST to wp-login.php and access with blank User Agent, preventing most brute-force attacks and reducing server load.</li>
<li>Blocks access to .txt files under any plugin/theme directory to prevent scans for installed plugins/themes.</li>
<li>Blocks any query string trying to get a copy of the wp-config.php file.</li>
<li>Blocks gf_page=upload query string argument, this was deprecated in Gravity Forms on May 2015, if your copy of Gravity Forms still uses it, update now!</li>
<li>Removes version information from page headers. This includes not only the page header (html or xhtml) but also feed headers (rss, rss2, atom, rdf) and opml comments. Only the version number is removed, not the entire generator information. </li>
</ul>
(*) If your theme uses TimThumb, you can disable that blocking rule, check FAQ before installing the plugin to see how.
<h4>Requirements</h4>
<ul>
<li>WordPress 3.9.2 or higher. (Works with WordPress network/multisite installation).</li>
<li>Apache 2.4.x web server</li>
</ul>
It has been tested in many servers including large providers like HostGator, Godaddy and 1&1 with optimal results, and it will work fine in any decent hosting service (that allows you to set options from .htaccess files).
Anyway, if you get any problem after activating the plugin, check FAQ for instructions on how to manually uninstall it.
If you’re not sure of which server is your hosting company using or if they allow to use custom .htaccess rules, I would recommend you to contact with your host support before installing the plugin.
<h4>Usage</h4>
To apply above mentioned security rules simply install and activate the plugin, no options page, no user setup!
If you need to remove the security rules for some reason, simply deactivate the plugin. If you want to add them again, activate the plugin again, that easy 😉
And remember, if your theme uses TimThumb, check FAQ before installing the plugin.

SAR One Click Security

Adds some extra security to your WordPress with only one click.

Clean .htaccess Tool vs SAR One Click Security