Joseph Scott

Work around for some versions of libxml2 2.7.x that strip out brackets when parsing XML. This plugin fixes XML-RPC requests that are mangled because of this problem. The real fix for this (making the use of this plugin unnecessary) is to use PHP 5.2.9+ with libxml2 2.7.3+.
For more information about this problem see <a href="https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/7771" rel="nofollow ugc">https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/7771</a>.

LibXML2 Fix

Work around for some versions of libxml2 2.7.x that strip out brackets when parsing XML.  This plugin fixes XML-RPC requests that are mangled because  …

Walter Ebert

This plugin does more than just using the <code>xmlrpc_enabled</code> hook, because that is only used “To disable XML-RPC methods that require authentication”.
Activating this plugin will also disable pingbacks, trackbacks, and Really Simple Discovery (RSD), because these rely on XML-RPC.
It works with any webserver, because it does not use the .htaccess file.
<h4>Testing the plugin</h4>
From the command line you can test if the plugin is working correctly using <a href="https://curl.haxx.se/" rel="nofollow ugc">cURL</a>. Replace the <code>example.com</code> link to match your website:
<pre><code>curl -d '<?xml version="1.0"?><methodCall><methodName>system.listMethods</methodName><params><param><value><string/></value></param></params></methodCall>' https://example.com/xmlrpc.php
</code></pre>
This should only return the following methods: 
– <code>system.multicall</code> 
– <code>system.listMethods</code> 
– <code>system.getCapabilities</code>

Remove XML-RPC Methods

Remove all WordPress methods from the XML-RPC API to increase security.

LibXML2 Fix vs Remove XML-RPC Methods