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Security report for german-design-award.com

German Design Council · Other · Germany

Medium risk. 7 critical or high findings in Email security, Security headers and 2 other checks.

Security score

62/100

Risk levelMedium

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

The German Design Award website represents a well-established international design award platform managed by the German Design Council. It focuses on recognizing excellence in architecture, product, and communication design, targeting design professionals and organizations globally. The site offers comprehensive information about the award, jury, participation, and showcases awarded projects, reflecting a mature and professional business model with strong market positioning in the design industry. Technically, the website is built on TYPO3 CMS, leveraging modern web technologies such as FontAwesome, Swiper.js, and integrates multiple analytics and marketing tools including Google Analytics, Hotjar, and various advertising pixels. The site is mobile-optimized, accessible, and SEO-friendly, with a cookie consent mechanism and privacy policy that align with GDPR requirements. From a security perspective, the site enforces HTTPS and employs cookie consent management, though explicit security headers are not fully confirmed. No vulnerabilities or exposed sensitive data were detected. The WHOIS data is incomplete or privacy protected, which slightly reduces transparency but does not detract significantly from the site's legitimacy given the professional content and branding. Overall, the website presents a low-risk profile with strong business credibility and good privacy compliance. Strategic recommendations include enhancing transparency of security headers, publishing incident response policies, and monitoring WHOIS data for consistency.

Scanned

This is an earlier scan of german-design-award.com. View the latest report

NIS2 and GDPR posture

GDPR outside view
80/ 100 · Low
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

7 findings rated critical or high. Fix these first.

  1. Email security

    SPF, DKIM and DMARC stop others sending email that looks like it comes from your domain, a common route to phishing and invoice fraud.

    • Critical

      No email authentication configured

      Domain is vulnerable to email spoofing

      What to do: Implement SPF, DKIM, and DMARC immediately

    • High

      No SPF record found

      SPF helps prevent email spoofing

      What to do: Add SPF record: "v=spf1 include:_spf.yourmailprovider.com ~all"

  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 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 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 german-design-award.com

This scan found 26 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

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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
52
Security headers
40
Email security
40
DNS health
60
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
80
Average
62

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

Breach exposure

Leaked credentials and lookalike domains from OffSeq Breach. The counts are free; the detailed lists are paid add-ons.

Dark web exposure

Add-on

Leaked records that mention german-design-award.com, from OffSeq Breach.

Total records
53
Employees
0
Customers
53
Third parties
0
Weak passwords
19%

2 subdomains affected

See the 10 newest leaked credentials

A one-off add-on to this report that lists the most recent identifier and password pairs OffSeq Breach holds for german-design-award.com.

Select it in the checkout above.

Breach keeps ingesting new leaks, so these numbers can grow between scans.

Technical appendix

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

Business context

Business profile

The German Design Award is positioned as a prestigious international design award with a strong network and visibility benefits for participants. Its business model revolves around organizing competitions, jury evaluations, award ceremonies, and promoting awarded projects. The target customers are design professionals and organizations seeking recognition and networking opportunities. The organization leverages partnerships and media collaborations to enhance reach. Growth indicators include active news updates, social media engagement, and a modern digital platform. The company operates primarily in Germany with a medium-sized organizational footprint and a history dating back to 1953.

Security posture

The website demonstrates a mature security posture with HTTPS enforced and a comprehensive cookie consent mechanism that supports GDPR compliance. Use of Google Tag Manager and third-party analytics is controlled via consent. No direct security policies or incident response information is published, representing an area for improvement. No vulnerabilities or sensitive data exposures were found. The absence of explicit security headers like X-Frame-Options and X-Content-Type-Options should be addressed to enhance protection against clickjacking and MIME sniffing attacks. Overall, the security maturity is good but could benefit from formalized policies and header implementations.

Recommendations

  1. Implement and explicitly publish security headers such as X-Frame-Options and X-Content-Type-Options.
  2. Develop and make accessible a formal security policy and incident response plan on the website.
  3. Regularly audit and update third-party scripts and tracking tools to minimize vulnerabilities.
  4. Increase transparency of WHOIS data or provide justification for privacy protection to enhance trust.
  5. Enhance data retention policy disclosures related to analytics and tracking for improved privacy compliance.

Contact details published on the site

Addresses
Legal name
German Design Council
Site observations

Automated reading of the public site. Ratings are indicative.

Business

Company
German Design Council
Description
Der German Design Award zeichnet herausragendes Design in Architektur, Produkt- und Kommunikationsdesign aus – international, innovativ, wegweisend. Ausgerichtet vom German Design Council, steht der German Design Award für Designqualität mit Haltung – interdisziplinär gedacht, global vernetzt, strategisch relevant.
Key services
Design award competitions, Jury sessions, Award ceremonies, Design project showcases, Networking and visibility for designers
Content quality
excellent
Branding
consistent

Technology

Stack
TYPO3 CMS, FontAwesome 5.15.3, Swiper.js, Google Tag Manager, Hotjar, Pinterest tracking, Cookie Consent Manager CCM19
Frameworks
TYPO3 CMS
Performance
moderate
Mobile
good
Accessibility
good
SEO
good

Security

Observed score
85/100
Good practices seen
  • HTTPS enforced
  • Cookie consent mechanism implemented
  • No exposed sensitive data in HTML
  • Use of Google Tag Manager for controlled script loading

Analytics and tracking

Services
Google Analytics, Google Analytics 4, Hotjar
Tracking level
extensive
Privacy practices
good

Advertising

Ad networks
Google Ads, LinkedIn Ads, Microsoft Ads, Pinterest Ads, Facebook Ads
Tracking pixels
Google Analytics 4, Hotjar, Meta Pixel, LinkedIn Insight Tag, Facebook Pixel
Marketing tools
Salesforce
Transparency
good

Site quality

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

Key observations

  1. Website is fully accessible with rich content and professional design
  2. Strong focus on design awards and community engagement
  3. Comprehensive cookie consent and privacy mechanisms implemented
  4. Use of modern CMS TYPO3 and multiple third-party analytics and marketing tools
  5. No security or content blocking detected
  6. WHOIS data is missing or privacy protected, which slightly impacts trust
  7. Social media presence is strong with Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube links
  8. No direct contact emails or phone numbers found in HTML; contact likely via contact form
Technical notes

Notes

The website is built on TYPO3 CMS, a robust and scalable content management system suitable for enterprise-grade websites. It uses modern front-end libraries like FontAwesome for icons and Swiper.js for interactive carousels. The site integrates multiple third-party services for analytics (Google Analytics, Hotjar), marketing (Google Ads, LinkedIn Ads, Facebook Pixel), and cookie consent management (CCM19). Performance is moderate with responsive design and accessibility features implemented. The technical stack is modern and well-maintained, though hosting provider details are not explicitly identified. Opportunities exist to optimize loading times and enhance security headers for better technical resilience.
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. 62/100Medium35 findingsView report
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