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Security report for gencat.cat

Generalitat de Catalunya · Government · Spain

Medium risk. 6 critical or high findings in Security headers and GDPR outside view.

Security score

63/100

Risk levelMedium

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

The website gencat.cat serves as the official digital portal for the Generalitat de Catalunya, providing comprehensive information, public services, and electronic government functionalities to citizens and residents of Catalonia. It is a mature and authoritative platform with a broad range of services including public administration information, citizen support, and access to official documents and registrations. The site targets a wide audience seeking government-related information and services, positioning itself as the primary government web presence for the region. Technically, the site employs a mix of established web technologies such as jQuery, Bootstrap, Leaflet for maps, and Algolia for search, alongside analytics tools like Piwik PRO and Siteimprove. While the site is mobile-optimized and accessible, its performance is hindered by a slow load time and a large page size. The CMS appears to be custom or proprietary, with no explicit detection of popular CMS platforms. From a security perspective, the site exhibits significant weaknesses. It lacks a valid SSL certificate and does not support modern TLS protocols, resulting in no HTTPS protection. Security headers are absent, and advanced DNS security features like DNSSEC and CAA records are not implemented. However, the site does maintain a DMARC policy with abuse contact emails, indicating some level of email security awareness. The absence of domain protection locks is a minor concern but does not critically undermine trust. Overall, the site is trustworthy and professional in content and presentation but requires urgent security improvements to protect user data and ensure secure communications. Strategic recommendations include implementing HTTPS with a valid certificate, enabling modern TLS protocols, adding security headers, and improving performance. Privacy compliance is well addressed with clear policies and consent mechanisms, supporting GDPR adherence.

Scanned

This is an earlier scan of gencat.cat. View the latest report

NIS2 and GDPR posture

GDPR outside view
40/ 100 · High
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. 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';…

  2. GDPR outside view

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

    • High

      No Privacy Policy found

      GDPR requires a clear and accessible privacy policy

      What to do: Add a comprehensive privacy policy page and link to it prominently

    • 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

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

Keep watching gencat.cat

This scan found 23 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
85
Security headers
15
Email security
75
DNS health
65
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
40
Average
63

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

The Generalitat de Catalunya operates gencat.cat as its official government portal, serving as a centralized hub for public administration, citizen services, and information dissemination. The business model is public sector service provision, focusing on transparency, accessibility, and digital transformation of government services. The site supports multiple languages, reflecting the regional linguistic diversity and inclusivity. It integrates with various government-related domains and services, forming a comprehensive ecosystem for citizens. The portal's market position is strong as the authoritative source for Catalan government information. It leverages partnerships with other government entities and service providers, such as health, employment, and public transport sectors. The presence of extensive content, official social media channels, and contact points indicates a mature digital strategy aimed at citizen engagement and service efficiency. Growth indicators include continuous content updates, new service integrations, and user experience enhancements.

Security posture

The current security posture of gencat.cat is weak due to the absence of HTTPS and valid SSL certificates, exposing users to potential data interception and man-in-the-middle attacks. The lack of modern TLS protocol support and missing security headers further exacerbate the risk. While the domain is protected against subdomain takeover and has a DMARC policy with abuse contacts, critical security best practices are not fully implemented. No evidence of a dedicated security policy or incident response page was found, which could limit transparency and readiness in handling security incidents. The site does not provide vulnerability disclosure information or a security.txt file, reducing opportunities for coordinated vulnerability reporting. Overall, the site requires immediate remediation to secure communications and enhance trustworthiness.

Recommendations

  1. Implement and maintain a valid SSL/TLS certificate to enable HTTPS across the entire site.
  2. Enable modern TLS protocols (TLS 1.2 and TLS 1.3) and disable deprecated protocols to ensure secure connections.
  3. Add essential security headers such as Content-Security-Policy, X-Frame-Options, and X-Content-Type-Options.
  4. Enable DNSSEC and configure CAA records to strengthen DNS security and certificate issuance control.
  5. Improve site performance by optimizing resources to reduce load time and page size.
  6. Publish a clear security policy and incident response information to enhance transparency and preparedness.
  7. Implement a vulnerability disclosure program and provide a security.txt file for coordinated reporting.
  8. Enable domain protection locks to prevent unauthorized domain modifications.
Technical notes

Notes

The website uses a combination of jQuery, Bootstrap, Leaflet, and Algolia for frontend functionality, indicating a modern but somewhat traditional tech stack. Analytics are handled via Piwik PRO and Siteimprove, with event tracking on video content. The site is mobile-optimized and accessible, with good SEO meta tags and Open Graph data. Performance is a concern, with a high load time (~15.6 seconds) and a large page size (~855 KB). The hosting appears stable with a mature domain and consistent DNS records, but the lack of SSL and modern TLS support is a critical technical deficiency. The CMS is likely custom-built, as no common CMS signatures were detected. Opportunities exist to modernize security infrastructure and optimize resource delivery to improve user experience and security.
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. 64/100Medium32 findingsView report
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