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Security report for apachecon.com

The Apache Software Foundation · Technology · United States

Medium risk. 4 critical or high findings in Security headers, GDPR outside view and 1 other check.

Security score

67/100

Risk levelMedium

0–100, higher is better. How it is calculated

ApacheCon.com is the official website for the global conference series organized by The Apache Software Foundation, a well-established non-profit organization focused on open source software projects. The website serves as a hub for event information, community engagement, and sponsor recognition, targeting developers and technology professionals interested in Apache projects. The business model centers on community-driven conferences and educational events, supported by reputable technology sponsors, positioning ApacheCon as a key player in the open source conference market. Technically, the website employs a modern but straightforward tech stack including Bootstrap, jQuery, and Slick Carousel for UI components, hosted on AWS infrastructure as inferred from DNS records. The site is mobile optimized with good SEO practices and basic accessibility features, though some improvements could be made in security headers and cookie consent mechanisms. Performance is moderate with no critical technical debt observed. From a security perspective, the site uses HTTPS and has domain transfer protections in place, but lacks DNSSEC and explicit security headers. No forms on the homepage collect sensitive data, and no vulnerability disclosure or incident response contacts are published, indicating room for maturity in security transparency. The WHOIS data shows a long-standing domain with privacy protection justified by the non-profit nature of the organization, supporting legitimacy. Overall, ApacheCon.com is a professional, trustworthy, and content-rich site with a strong business credibility score. Recommendations include enhancing security headers, implementing cookie consent, publishing vulnerability disclosure policies, and enabling DNSSEC to further strengthen security posture and privacy compliance.

Scanned

NIS2 and GDPR posture

GDPR outside view
53/ 100 · Medium
Checks completed
7of 7

NIS2 Art. 21(2)

  1. (a) Risk analysis and security policies: Not visible from outside
  2. (b) Incident handling: One indicator
  3. (c) Business continuity, backups and crisis management: Not visible from outside
  4. (d) Supply chain security: Not visible from outside
  5. (e) Secure acquisition, development and maintenance, including vulnerability handling: Partly checked
  6. (f) Assessing the effectiveness of security measures: Not visible from outside
  7. (g) Cyber hygiene and security training: Not visible from outside
  8. (h) Cryptography and encryption: Partly checked
  9. (i) HR security, access control and asset management: One indicator
  10. (j) Multi-factor authentication and secured communications: Not visible from outside

This scan rated NIS2 with an earlier keyword method that is no longer shown; rescan for the per-article view. Risk management, continuity, supply chain, training, MFA, management oversight (Art. 20) and incident reporting (Art. 23) need internal evidence, and Guard cannot tell whether NIS2 applies to this organisation.

GDPR is indicative only, based on publicly visible signals: Articles 7, 12, 13 and 32 of Regulation (EU) 2016/679 and Article 5(3) of the ePrivacy Directive. Not a certification or legal assessment.

Priority findings

4 findings rated critical or high. Fix these first.

  1. Security headers

    Security headers are instructions your web server sends to every visitor’s browser. Missing ones leave visitors more exposed to attacks such as clickjacking and injected scripts.

    • High

      Missing X-Frame-Options header

      Prevents clickjacking attacks

      What to do: Add "X-Frame-Options: DENY" or "X-Frame-Options: SAMEORIGIN"

  2. GDPR outside view

    These are the privacy signals visitors and data protection authorities look for under GDPR.

    • High

      No Cookie Policy found

      GDPR requires clear information about cookie usage

      What to do: Add a dedicated cookie policy explaining cookie usage and purposes

    • High

      No Cookie Consent Banner found

      GDPR requires explicit consent for non-essential cookies

      What to do: Implement a cookie consent banner that appears on first visit

  3. DNS health

    DNS sends visitors and email to the right servers. Misconfigured records can cause outages or let someone redirect your traffic.

    • High

      Unregistered MX Record

      MX record points to unregistered domain: mx1-lw-us.apache.org

      What to do: Remove or fix MX record pointing to unregistered domain

      • RFC 5321 §5.1
      • NIS2 21(2)(i)
      • IR 2024/2690 12.4: Implementing Regulation (EU) 2024/2690, Annex point 12.4: Asset inventory
      • NIST CM-8: NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5 CM-8: System Component Inventory

Need hands-on remediation? Email guard@offseq.com

Keep watching apachecon.com

This scan found 24 issues across 6 checks. Monitoring re-runs those checks daily, emails you when something material changes and records each fix, so you can show progress.

Daily monitoring

Recommended

€25per month

  • TLS certificates and expiry
  • DNS records
  • SPF, DKIM and DMARC
  • Security headers
  • GDPR and NIS2 posture
  • Exposed services
  • Third-party trackers
  • Security score drift

Email alerts on material changes and an exportable JSON history of every change.

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Full report

€39.90one-time

  • The complete analysis as a PDF you can cite
  • Email delivery with an unlock code
  • Lifetime access to this report

Prices incl. 21% VAT. Secure checkout by Mollie; sold by SEQ SIA, Latvia.

Results by check

Each check with its score, findings and the evidence it collected.

How this score is calculated

The security score runs 0–100, higher is better. It is the plain average of the security checks that completed in this scan, each counted equally. A check that could not run is left out: it counts neither as a pass nor as a fail.

Counted in this score

SSL/TLS
85
Security headers
40
Email security
70
DNS health
55
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
53
Average
67

Not counted

  • NIS2 outside view: Re-weights evidence from the TLS, email, DNS, network and hygiene checks, so counting it would count that evidence twice. Shown on its own.
  • OffSeq Observations: An AI reading of the site, useful context but not reproducible evidence. Shown on its own.

Findings that cap the score at 49

Each of these is serious on its own, so while any is present the site cannot rate better than high risk, however good the other checks are.

  • The certificate is not trusted by browsers
  • The website is not served over HTTPS
  • A database, remote desktop, file-sharing or Telnet service is reachable from the internet
  • The page loads a script from a compromised source
  • The domain registration has expired
  • SPF authorises every server to send mail as the domain

Partial scans

When the site blocks Guard or most checks cannot run, the score covers only the checks that ran (usually DNS and email), is capped at 75 and is shown as partial, without a risk level.

Risk levels

  • Critical0–25
  • High26–49
  • Medium50–75
  • Low76–100

Technical appendix

Business context, site observations and technical notes gathered during the scan, and the standards behind each reference.

Business context

Business profile

ApacheCon operates as the official conference series for The Apache Software Foundation, leveraging its strong brand and community to attract developers and open source enthusiasts globally. The business model is non-profit and community-focused, relying on sponsorships from major technology companies such as Apple, AWS, Google Cloud, and Red Hat. This sponsorship ecosystem provides financial and reputational support, enabling high-quality events. The target audience includes software developers, project contributors, and technology leaders interested in Apache projects. The website's market position is strong within the open source event niche, with a consistent brand and professional content supporting growth and community engagement.

Security posture

The website demonstrates a moderate security maturity level with HTTPS enforced and domain transfer protections. However, the absence of DNSSEC, security headers, and vulnerability disclosure policies indicates gaps in defense-in-depth and transparency. No exposed sensitive data or vulnerable libraries were detected, and no forms on the homepage collect sensitive information, reducing immediate risk. Incident response readiness is unclear due to lack of published contacts. Compliance with GDPR is partial, with a privacy policy present but no cookie consent mechanism. Overall, the security posture is adequate but could benefit from enhancements to meet best practices and regulatory expectations.

Recommendations

  1. Enable DNSSEC on the domain to improve DNS security and prevent spoofing.
  2. Implement standard security headers such as Content Security Policy (CSP), HSTS, X-Frame-Options, and X-Content-Type-Options.
  3. Add a clear cookie policy and implement a consent mechanism to comply with privacy regulations.
  4. Publish a vulnerability disclosure policy or security.txt file to improve transparency and incident response readiness.
  5. Regularly audit third-party libraries and scripts to ensure no vulnerabilities are introduced.
Site observations

Automated reading of the public site. Ratings are indicative.

Business

Company
The Apache Software Foundation
Description
The official global conference series of The Apache Software Foundation, showcasing innovations from Apache projects and their communities in a vendor-neutral environment.
Key services
Global conferences, Community events, Educational sessions on Apache projects
Content quality
good
Branding
consistent

Technology

Stack
Bootstrap, jQuery, Slick Carousel
Frameworks
Bootstrap
Performance
moderate
Mobile
good
Accessibility
basic
SEO
good

Security

Observed score
70/100
Good practices seen
  • HTTPS enforced (implied by canonical URL https://apachecon.com/)
  • Domain status clientTransferProhibited

Analytics and tracking

Tracking level
minimal
Privacy practices
basic

Advertising

Transparency
poor

Site quality

Design
good
User experience
good
Content relevance
good
Navigation
good
Professionalism
good
Trustworthiness
high

Key observations

  1. Website is fully accessible with no blocking or WAF challenges.
  2. Content is focused on ApacheCon events and Apache Software Foundation community.
  3. No forms with sensitive data collection detected on homepage; contact form exists on separate page.
  4. No explicit cookie consent mechanism found.
  5. Social media presence is active with official ApacheCon accounts.
  6. Sponsors include major technology companies indicating strong industry support.
Technical notes

Notes

The website uses a classic web technology stack with Bootstrap for responsive design, jQuery for DOM manipulation, and Slick Carousel for interactive elements. Hosting is on AWS as indicated by DNS nameservers, providing reliable infrastructure. The site loads moderately fast with no major performance bottlenecks detected. SEO is supported by proper meta tags and Open Graph data. Accessibility is basic but could be improved with ARIA roles and better keyboard navigation support. No CMS is detected, suggesting a custom or static site approach, which reduces attack surface but may increase maintenance overhead. Overall, the technical implementation is solid but could be modernized with progressive web app features or enhanced accessibility compliance.
Standards and sources

Reference chips under each finding point to the standard, regulation or specification the finding relates to. They are taken from the official datasets below and mapped conservatively: a finding with no defensible link shows none. NIS2 and GDPR references mark where a finding is relevant evidence, not a compliance verdict. Implementing Regulation (EU) 2024/2690 binds digital infrastructure and digital service providers; for other entities it is the most detailed public reading of the Article 21 measures. WCAG, EN 301 549, European Accessibility Act and Web Accessibility Directive references name the requirement an automated accessibility rule relates to; they are not a conformance verdict.

Retrieved 2026-10-25

Earlier scans of this domain

  1. 67/100Medium33 findingsView report
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