Title: Issue with Firewall
Last modified: February 3, 2022

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# Issue with Firewall

 *  Resolved [kospa](https://wordpress.org/support/users/kospa/)
 * (@kospa)
 * [4 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/issue-with-firewall/)
 * Hi,
 * I’m constantly getting the message to optimize the Wordfence Web Application 
   Firewall:
 * “To make your site as secure as possible, the Wordfence Web Application Firewall
   is designed to run via a PHP setting called auto_prepend_file, which ensures 
   it runs before any potentially vulnerable code runs. This PHP setting is currently
   in use, and is including this file:
 * /public_html/malcare-waf.php
 * You can proceed with the installation and we will include this from within our
   wordfence-waf.php file which should maintain compatibility with your site, or
   you can opt to override the existing PHP setting.”
 * Two options are offered:
 * INCLUDE and OVERRIDE
 * No matter which option I choose the message keeps coming back.
 * Any suggestions?

Viewing 1 replies (of 1 total)

 *  Plugin Support [wfpeter](https://wordpress.org/support/users/wfpeter/)
 * (@wfpeter)
 * [4 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/issue-with-firewall/#post-15328712)
 * Hi [@kospa](https://wordpress.org/support/users/kospa/), thanks for getting in
   touch.
 * We’ve seen new sites at Cloudways with Malcare installed by default as they provide
   it as part of some hosting packages. If this is configured or optimized after
   Wordfence, then it tends to cause the issue you’re seeing.
 * If you wish to leave Malcare installed or cannot remove it from your hosting 
   package, the `INCLUDE` option in our WAF optimization wizard should have overridden
   the Malcare `auto_prepend_file` value that points to **malcare-waf.php** so that
   our **wordfence-waf.php** file would then include the Malcare file. It may help
   to try this process without Malcare running in case the file being in use is 
   stopping our value being written/modified.
 * You can read more about optimization here in our documentation: [https://www.wordfence.com/help/firewall/optimizing-the-firewall/#firewall-optimization-setup](https://www.wordfence.com/help/firewall/optimizing-the-firewall/#firewall-optimization-setup)
 * Just as a note, there may be overlapping features when running two security plugins
   concurrently that can cause performance issues if both are scanning for the same
   vulnerabilities or checking the same files concurrently, so it would be advised
   to choose your preferred security plugin option and stick with that going forward.
 * If the documentation and re-trying optimization with only Wordfence running doesn’t
   help, let me know.
 * Thanks,
 * Peter.

Viewing 1 replies (of 1 total)

The topic ‘Issue with Firewall’ is closed to new replies.

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 * 1 reply
 * 2 participants
 * Last reply from: [wfpeter](https://wordpress.org/support/users/wfpeter/)
 * Last activity: [4 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/issue-with-firewall/#post-15328712)
 * Status: resolved