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Security report for competence.ch

Competence · Healthcare · Switzerland

High risk. 6 critical or high findings in Network security, Security headers and 1 other check.

Security score

49/100

Risk levelHigh

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

Competence.ch is a well-established online platform and magazine serving leadership and management professionals in the Swiss healthcare sector. It provides authoritative news, research, and innovation insights, supported by official partnerships with key Swiss healthcare organizations. The website demonstrates a mature digital infrastructure built on WordPress, integrating modern technologies such as Google Tag Manager, reCAPTCHA, and Borlabs Cookie for privacy compliance. Security posture is strong with HTTPS enforcement and cookie consent mechanisms, though explicit security policies and incident response contacts are not publicly available. Overall, the platform is professional, trustworthy, and compliant with GDPR requirements, targeting healthcare executives and professionals in Switzerland.

Scanned

NIS2 and GDPR posture

GDPR outside view
68/ 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

6 findings rated critical or high. Fix these first.

  1. Network security

    Services reachable from the internet are the first thing attackers probe. Anything open that does not need to be should be closed.

    • Critical

      Critical Service Exposed: MySQL

      Port 3306 (MySQL) is publicly accessible - MySQL - Database server

      What to do: Immediately restrict access to MySQL using firewall or VPN

      • NIS2 21(2)(e)
      • IR 2024/2690 6.7.2(f): Implementing Regulation (EU) 2024/2690, Annex point 6.7.2(f): Network security
      • NIST CM-7: NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5 CM-7: Least Functionality
      • NIST SC-7: NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5 SC-7: Boundary Protection

  2. 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 Strict-Transport-Security header

      Forces HTTPS connections

      What to do: Add "Strict-Transport-Security: max-age=31536000; includeSubDomains; preload"

      • CWE-319
      • OWASP A04:2025
      • ASVS V3.4.1
    • High

      Missing X-Frame-Options header

      Prevents clickjacking attacks

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

    • High

      Missing Content-Security-Policy header

      Controls resources the browser is allowed to load

      What to do: Implement a Content-Security-Policy appropriate for your application

      • ASVS V3.4.3
      • OWASP Secure Headers: OWASP Secure Headers Project recommends Content-Security-Policy: default-src 'self'; form-action 'self'; base-uri 'self'; object-src 'none';…

  3. GDPR outside view

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

    • 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

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

Keep watching competence.ch

This scan found 22 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

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

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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
95
Security headers
15
Email security
85
DNS health
75
Network security
0
GDPR outside view
68
Average
56
After the cap
49

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 · found on this site
  • 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

The website occupies a niche media position focused on healthcare management in Switzerland, leveraging partnerships with H+ and the Swiss Association of Hospital Directors. Its business model centers on content subscription, advertising, and event promotion. The platform's content is highly relevant and tailored to healthcare leaders, with a strong emphasis on innovation, quality, and management topics. The presence of a job portal and newsletter indicates diversified engagement channels. The partnership ecosystem includes recognized healthcare and media production entities, enhancing credibility and reach.

Security posture

Competence.ch exhibits a solid security posture with HTTPS enabled and use of security best practices such as Google reCAPTCHA and cookie consent management. However, the absence of a published security policy or incident response contact limits transparency. No vulnerabilities or exposed sensitive data were detected in the HTML content. The site uses trusted third-party scripts and manages user data responsibly. Recommendations include publishing explicit security policies, implementing security.txt, and enhancing security headers to further strengthen defenses.

Recommendations

  1. Publish a dedicated security policy page detailing security practices and incident response procedures.
  2. Implement and expose a security.txt file to facilitate vulnerability reporting.
  3. Enhance HTTP security headers such as X-Content-Type-Options and X-XSS-Protection.
  4. Regularly audit third-party scripts and plugins for vulnerabilities and updates.
  5. Improve accessibility compliance to broaden user inclusivity and meet standards.
Site observations

Automated reading of the public site. Ratings are indicative.

Business

Company
Competence
Description
Competence is an online platform and magazine serving leadership and management professionals in the Swiss healthcare sector, focusing on hospital news, management, technology, research, and quality.
Key services
Healthcare news and articles, Magazine subscription, Newsletter, Event information, Job portal
Content quality
excellent
Branding
consistent

Technology

Stack
WordPress 6.8.3, jQuery 3.7.1, Google Tag Manager, Google reCAPTCHA, Flickity carousel, Borlabs Cookie consent plugin, Mailchimp newsletter integration, FontAwesome icons
Frameworks
WordPress
Platforms
Web
Performance
moderate
Mobile
good
Accessibility
basic
SEO
good

Security

Observed score
85/100
Good practices seen
  • HTTPS enforced
  • Use of Google reCAPTCHA for forms
  • Cookie consent management via Borlabs Cookie
  • No exposed sensitive data in HTML

Analytics and tracking

Services
Google Analytics
Tracking level
moderate
Privacy practices
good

Advertising

Ad networks
Google Ad Manager
Marketing tools
Mailchimp, Borlabs Cookie
Transparency
good

Site quality

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

Key observations

  1. Website is a professional healthcare media platform targeting Swiss healthcare executives.
  2. Content is rich, well-structured, and regularly updated with articles and newsletters.
  3. Strong partnerships with recognized Swiss healthcare organizations.
  4. Good privacy and cookie compliance with explicit consent mechanisms.
  5. No visible security or content blocking issues.
  6. Use of modern web technologies and CMS (WordPress).
  7. Advertising and analytics are transparently implemented.
  8. No contact emails explicitly found in the HTML snippet; contact forms and pages are present.
  9. No explicit terms of service page detected.
Technical notes

Notes

The website is built on WordPress 6.8.3 with a modern tech stack including jQuery, Flickity carousel, FontAwesome icons, and Google Tag Manager. Performance is moderate with good mobile optimization and SEO practices. The site integrates Mailchimp for newsletter subscriptions and Borlabs Cookie for GDPR-compliant cookie management. While the infrastructure is solid, opportunities exist to improve accessibility and security header implementation. Hosting provider details were not explicitly found. Overall, the technical implementation supports a professional and user-friendly experience.
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

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