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Security report for heise-academy.de

heise academy · Education · Germany

Medium risk. 4 critical or high findings in GDPR outside view and Security headers.

Security score

71/100

Risk levelMedium

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

heise academy is a well-established German IT education provider offering a wide range of online courses, live trainings, workshops, and webinars tailored for IT professionals and corporate teams. Leveraging over 40 years of heritage from the reputable heise brand, it positions itself as a trusted source for modern digital IT training. The website demonstrates a mature technical infrastructure using modern frameworks like Next.js and React, ensuring fast performance and excellent mobile optimization. Security posture is solid with HTTPS and secure form practices, though some improvements in security headers and explicit policies could enhance it further. Overall, the business credibility is high with clear contact information, professional content, and consistent branding. No blocking or WAF challenges were detected, allowing full content accessibility and analysis.

Scanned

This is an earlier scan of heise-academy.de. View the latest report

NIS2 and GDPR posture

GDPR outside view
28/ 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

4 findings rated critical or high. Fix these first.

  1. GDPR outside view

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

    • Critical

      EU business without adequate privacy measures

      EU businesses are subject to strict GDPR requirements

      What to do: Implement comprehensive GDPR compliance including privacy policy, cookie consent, and data protection measures

    • 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

  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 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';…

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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
65
Email security
75
DNS health
65
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
28
Average
71

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 heise-academy.de, from OffSeq Breach.

Total records
1
Employees
0
Customers
1
Third parties
0
Weak passwords
0%

1 subdomain 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 heise-academy.de.

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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 heise academy operates in the education and technology sectors, focusing on IT professional development. Its business model revolves around paid online courses and subscription-based access to learning content. The company benefits from strong brand recognition through its association with heise, a leading German IT publisher. Target customers include individual IT professionals and corporate teams seeking continuous skill enhancement. The website's comprehensive course catalog and multiple learning formats (classrooms, workshops, webinars, video courses) indicate a diversified offering. The presence of social media channels and downloadable marketing materials suggests active engagement and growth orientation. The lack of visible certifications or security policies indicates areas for future trust-building enhancements.

Security posture

The website employs HTTPS with an excellent SSL configuration, ensuring encrypted communications. Security best practices such as secure form inputs and no exposed sensitive data are observed. However, the absence of explicit security headers like Content Security Policy (CSP), HSTS, and X-Frame-Options reduces the overall security hardening. No vulnerability disclosures or security.txt files are present, which could limit incident response readiness. The site does not display cookie consent mechanisms, which may impact GDPR compliance. Overall, the security posture is good but could be improved by implementing additional headers, formal security policies, and user consent mechanisms.

Recommendations

  1. Implement comprehensive security headers including CSP, HSTS, and X-Frame-Options to enhance protection against common web attacks.
  2. Add explicit privacy and cookie consent banners to improve GDPR compliance and user transparency.
  3. Publish a vulnerability disclosure policy or security.txt file to facilitate responsible security reporting.
  4. Conduct regular security audits of third-party scripts and dependencies to identify and mitigate vulnerabilities.
  5. Enhance trust signals by displaying relevant certifications and security compliance badges on the website.

Contact details published on the site

Addresses
Legal name
heise academy
Site observations

Automated reading of the public site. Ratings are indicative.

Business

Company
heise academy
Description
Die heise academy bietet Workshops, Seminare, Webinare und eLearning-Angebote zu IT-Themen für IT-Professionals und Unternehmen. Sie fokussiert sich auf moderne, digitale Weiterbildung mit über 40 Jahren Erfahrung in der IT-Branche.
Key services
Online courses, Live trainings, Workshops, Webinars, eLearning
Content quality
excellent
Branding
consistent

Technology

Stack
React, Next.js, JavaScript, CSS, SVG
Frameworks
Next.js
Performance
fast
Mobile
excellent
Accessibility
good
SEO
good

Security

Observed score
85/100
Good practices seen
  • HTTPS enforced
  • No exposed sensitive data in HTML
  • Secure forms with autocomplete off

Analytics and tracking

Tracking level
minimal
Privacy practices
basic

Advertising

Transparency
poor

Site quality

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

Key observations

  1. Website is fully accessible with no blocking or WAF challenge.
  2. Content is professional and targeted at IT professionals and companies.
  3. Strong brand association with heise, a reputable German IT publisher.
  4. Good use of modern web technologies and responsive design.
  5. Contact information and legal address clearly provided.
  6. No explicit privacy or cookie consent banners detected.
  7. No visible security.txt or vulnerability disclosure policy.
  8. No advertising or tracking scripts detected in provided HTML.
  9. Social media presence on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube linked.
  10. WHOIS data is minimal but consistent with brand name servers.
Technical notes

Notes

The website is built using modern web technologies including React and Next.js, which support server-side rendering and optimized performance. The use of a headless CMS (likely Contentful) enables flexible content management. The site is mobile-optimized with responsive images and accessible navigation. Performance indicators suggest fast loading times and smooth user experience. However, no explicit hosting provider or CDN information was found. The technical implementation is robust, but adding accessibility enhancements and SEO improvements could further increase reach and usability.
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. 71/100Medium29 findingsView report
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