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Security report for iabuk.com

IAB UK · Media · United Kingdom

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

Security score

71/100

Risk levelMedium

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

IAB UK is a prominent industry association uniting over 300 members from the digital advertising ecosystem including media owners, agencies, brands, and ad tech providers. The organization focuses on championing innovation, setting standards, providing research, events, and training to build a sustainable future for digital advertising in the UK. Their website reflects a mature digital presence with comprehensive content, clear navigation, and active engagement through social media and member services. Technically, the site is built on Drupal 11 and integrates modern JavaScript libraries and marketing tools such as Google Tag Manager and AddEvent. However, a critical security gap exists due to the absence of a valid SSL certificate and HTTPS support, exposing users to potential risks and undermining trust. Privacy and cookie policies are well implemented, indicating good compliance with GDPR and related regulations. Overall, the site demonstrates strong business credibility and content quality but requires urgent security improvements to meet modern standards.

Scanned

This is an earlier scan of iabuk.com. View the latest report

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 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 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 iabuk.com

This scan found 20 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.

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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
40
Email security
70
DNS health
85
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
43
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

Technical appendix

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

Business context

Business profile

IAB UK holds a leading position as the UK’s digital advertising industry body, providing essential services such as policy advocacy, standards development, research, and member engagement. Their business model is membership-based, targeting digital advertising professionals and companies. The organization leverages partnerships with major industry players, as evidenced by member logos and certifications like the IAB Gold Standard. The website supports growth and engagement through events, training, and digital resources. The presence of an AI chatbot indicates investment in innovative member support. The lack of SSL is a notable risk factor that could impact user trust and business reputation if not addressed promptly.

Security posture

The website currently lacks a valid SSL certificate and does not support any TLS protocols, resulting in unencrypted HTTP traffic. While some security headers like X-Content-Type-Options and X-Frame-Options are present, the absence of HTTPS is a critical vulnerability. No advanced security features such as HSTS, OCSP stapling, or session resumption are enabled. There is no evidence of a published security policy or incident response contact channels. These gaps expose the site and its users to risks including data interception and man-in-the-middle attacks. Immediate remediation is recommended to install and configure SSL/TLS properly and enhance security headers and mechanisms.

Recommendations

  1. Install and configure a valid SSL/TLS certificate to enable HTTPS across the entire site.
  2. Enable modern TLS protocols (TLS 1.2 or TLS 1.3) and disable insecure protocols.
  3. Implement HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS) with includeSubDomains and preload directives.
  4. Enable OCSP stapling to improve certificate revocation checks and site performance.
  5. Publish a clear security policy and provide incident response contact information.
  6. Regularly audit and update third-party libraries and scripts to avoid vulnerabilities.
  7. Enhance privacy compliance by clearly documenting data retention policies.
  8. Improve performance metrics and optimize resource loading for faster user experience.
  9. Maintain consistent branding and trust signals across all pages and communications.
  10. Leverage analytics data responsibly with transparent user tracking disclosures.

Contact details published on the site

Addresses
Technical notes

Notes

The website is powered by Drupal 11 CMS, indicating a modern and supported content management platform. It uses several JavaScript libraries including jQuery, Colorbox, and AddEvent for UI enhancements and marketing functionalities. Google Tag Manager is integrated for analytics and tag management. Hosting is via Cloudflare, providing CDN and security services, although SSL is not configured properly. The site is mobile optimized with responsive design and accessibility features such as skip links and ARIA roles. SEO best practices are observed with meta tags, canonical links, and structured navigation menus. Performance data was not available, but the presence of multiple scripts suggests potential for optimization. Overall, the technical infrastructure is solid but requires security hardening and performance tuning.
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. 71/100 +7Medium27 findingsView report
  2. 64/100 −6Medium28 findingsView report
  3. 70/100 −1Medium28 findingsView report
  4. 71/100Medium27 findingsView report
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