IP Address Whitelist to Allow WordPress Core Auto Updates

Question

I'm working on a site based on a server with quite strict firewall rules. It won't allow anything running on the site to connect an external server unless its IP address is explicitly whitelisted.

Does anyone know where to find the IP address(es) of the WordPress core updater?

Thanks

Answer 1

Just checked and the IP right now is: 198.143.164.250

Do you want an programmable-in-php way to do it? You could run this on a WP-Cron schedule (adding some code) to check if the IP has changed at all and change it in your firewall if so while deleting the old IP (or use a hook to update the whitelist right before the major update calls all to download the zip). The code will only be as hard as how to whitelist things in your firewall. Hopefully it's something like:

$whitelist_ip = gethostbyname('downloads.wordpress.org');
add_to_whitelist($whitelist_ip);

Obviously the add_to_whitelist function is hypothetical (a function that either already exists, or you'd need to write) because adding an IP to a firewall depends entirely on what kind of firewall you're using which you may want to edit your original question to explain your firewall and how you add IPs to it.