When scaling WordPress sites, one of the most common bottlenecks developers overlook is the architectural placement of their Web Application Firewall (WAF). The Pre-WordPress Execution Trap Most security plugins (like Wordfence) rely on PHP's auto_prepend_file directive in . htaccess or .
Source: [Dev.to](https://dev.to/stardothosting/why-autoprependfile-and-on-server-wordpress-firewalls-cause-ttfb-lag-njh)