Skip to main content

Security report for horatioalger.org

Horatio Alger Association · Non-profit · United States

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

Security score

73/100

Risk levelMedium

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

The Horatio Alger Association is a well-established 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to promoting the American Dream through scholarships and support services for students facing adversity. With a mature domain dating back to 1997 and a strong market position as one of North America's largest need-based scholarship providers, the organization demonstrates a clear commitment to education and philanthropy. The website reflects a professional and consistent brand image, targeting students, donors, and supporters with rich content and multimedia elements. Technically, the site is built on WordPress with modern plugins such as Yoast SEO and Google Site Kit, leveraging Cloudflare for hosting and CDN services. While the site is mobile-optimized and SEO-friendly, performance metrics are not fully available. Security posture is currently weak due to the absence of a valid SSL certificate and HTTPS support, which is a critical issue that must be addressed to protect user data and maintain trust. Privacy compliance is partially met with the presence of privacy and legal policies, but lacks a cookie consent mechanism and explicit GDPR compliance indicators. Contact information is comprehensive and clearly presented, enhancing business credibility. Overall, the site is trustworthy and professional but requires urgent security improvements to align with best practices. Strategic recommendations include immediate SSL/TLS implementation, enabling modern security headers and protocols, and introducing cookie consent mechanisms to improve privacy compliance and user trust.

Scanned

NIS2 and GDPR posture

GDPR outside view
43/ 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. 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"

  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

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

Keep watching horatioalger.org

This scan found 18 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.

Billed monthly to your card. Cancel anytime. See sample alerts.

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
55
Email security
75
DNS health
80
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
43
Average
73

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

Horatio Alger Association operates in the non-profit education sector, focusing on scholarships and support services for underprivileged students. Its competitive advantage lies in its long-standing reputation, extensive scholarship programs, and strong philanthropic network. Revenue streams likely include donations, grants, and fundraising events. The target customer segments include students in need, donors, members, and educational partners. Growth indicators include continuous scholarship awards and active public outreach campaigns. The partnership ecosystem includes regional sites such as horatioalger.ca and media outlets. The organization's operations are transparent with financial statements and impact reports publicly available, supporting strategic growth and donor confidence.

Security posture

The current security maturity level is low due to the lack of HTTPS and valid SSL certificates, exposing the site to potential data interception risks. Security headers such as X-XSS-Protection and Content-Security-Policy are present, indicating some security awareness. No vulnerable libraries or exposed sensitive data were detected. However, the absence of HSTS, OCSP stapling, and session resumption mechanisms reduces overall security robustness. Compliance gaps exist in GDPR and cookie consent implementation. Incident response readiness and security culture indicators are not evident from the site. The business impact of these vulnerabilities includes potential loss of user trust and non-compliance with data protection regulations.

Recommendations

  1. Implement a valid SSL/TLS certificate and enforce HTTPS site-wide immediately.
  2. Enable HSTS with includeSubDomains and preload to prevent protocol downgrade attacks.
  3. Add a cookie consent banner/mechanism to comply with privacy regulations and improve transparency.
  4. Enable OCSP stapling and session resumption to enhance SSL performance and security.
  5. Conduct a privacy compliance audit to ensure GDPR and other relevant regulations are fully addressed.

Contact details published on the site

Addresses
Legal name
Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans, Inc.
Technical notes

Notes

The website uses a modern WordPress CMS with PHP 8.1.28, enhanced by Yoast SEO for search optimization and Google Site Kit for analytics integration. It leverages Cloudflare for CDN and DNS services, improving global reach and performance. JavaScript libraries such as jQuery, Backbone.js, and Underscore.js are used for dynamic content and UI interactions. The site is mobile-optimized with responsive design and accessibility features, though some accessibility aspects could be improved. Performance data is unavailable, suggesting a need for monitoring and optimization. Technical risks include outdated or missing SSL configuration and potential technical debt from legacy scripts or plugins.
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

Reviews of this site

Share your experience with horatioalger.org. Every review is verified by email and published after moderation.

Overall rating
Select a rating
4000 characters remaining

We’ll email you to confirm your review and keep your details private.

Community rating

No published reviews yet. Be the first to review horatioalger.org.

Feedback on this report

Rate this report, add an optional comment, and tell us if you want a security specialist to follow up.

Overall report quality
Select a rating
2000 characters remaining

We only use your feedback to improve Guard reports. Contact details are never shared.