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Security report for imperial.ac.uk

Imperial College London · Education · United Kingdom

High risk. 8 critical or high findings in GDPR outside view, SSL/TLS and 1 other check.

Security score

44/100

Risk levelHigh

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

Imperial College London is a prestigious higher education institution specializing in science, technology, engineering, medicine, and business. It holds a strong global market position, ranked among the top universities worldwide, and offers a broad range of educational programs and research initiatives. The website reflects this stature with professional design, comprehensive content, and clear navigation targeting students, researchers, and partners. Technically, the site uses a Microsoft IIS server with ASP.NET framework, enhanced by modern JavaScript libraries such as jQuery and GSAP, and is delivered via AWS CloudFront CDN. The CMS appears to be TerminalFour, supporting a robust content management environment. Accessibility and SEO optimizations are well implemented, though performance metrics are unavailable. Security posture is a critical concern due to the absence of a valid SSL certificate and HTTPS support, exposing users to potential risks. While some security headers and content security policies are present, the lack of TLS protocols and HSTS significantly lowers the security score. Privacy compliance is strong, with clear cookie consent mechanisms and privacy policies aligned with GDPR. Overall, the website is trustworthy and professionally managed but urgently requires SSL/TLS implementation to secure user data and maintain institutional reputation.

Scanned

This is an earlier scan of imperial.ac.uk. View the latest report

NIS2 and GDPR posture

GDPR outside view
0/ 100 · Critical
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

8 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

      No HTTPS encryption

      GDPR requires appropriate security measures for personal data

      What to do: Implement SSL/TLS certificate for HTTPS

    • 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

  2. SSL/TLS

    TLS encrypts the connection and proves the site is really yours. Weak or expiring certificates trigger browser warnings and put traffic at risk.

    • Critical

      No HTTPS Encryption

      Website does not use HTTPS encryption, making all data transmission vulnerable to interception

      What to do: Implement SSL/TLS certificate and redirect all HTTP traffic to HTTPS

  3. 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"

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

Keep watching imperial.ac.uk

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

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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

Email alerts on material changes and an exportable JSON history of every change.

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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
0
Security headers
30
Email security
50
DNS health
85
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
0
Average
44

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.

Brand lookalikes

Add-on

Domains that imitate imperial.ac.uk and could be used for phishing or spoofed email, tracked in OffSeq Breach.

Tracked
2
Registered
2
Resolving
2
High or critical
0

Last checked 2026-06-25

Masked preview

  • im••••••••.ukLowvarious
  • im••••••.ukLowvarious

See the full lookalike list

A one-off add-on that lists up to 20 of the highest-risk lookalikes of imperial.ac.uk with registration, mail-server, certificate and DNS signals.

Select it in the checkout above.

Lookalike data refreshes continuously. Monitoring on Breach alerts you when a variant is registered, gains a mail server or starts serving HTTPS.

Open in Breach(opens in a new tab)Monitor on Breach(opens in a new tab)

Technical appendix

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

Business context

Business profile

Imperial College London operates as a large educational entity focused on STEMB disciplines, serving a global audience including students, academics, and industry partners. Its competitive advantages include high global rankings, notable alumni and award winners, and extensive research collaborations. Revenue streams likely include tuition fees, research grants, executive education, and philanthropic giving. The institution maintains a broad partnership ecosystem with healthcare and innovation centers, enhancing its research and societal impact. Strategic observations highlight a focus on global expansion, sustainability, and innovation hubs such as WestTech London.

Security posture

The current security maturity level is low due to the absence of HTTPS and valid SSL certificates, which is a critical vulnerability for any modern website, especially one handling personal and academic data. No incident response or security policy pages were found, indicating potential gaps in transparency and preparedness. The site uses some security best practices like Content-Security-Policy but lacks HSTS and OCSP stapling. No known vulnerabilities or malware were detected, but the lack of encryption poses significant business risks including data interception and loss of user trust. Compliance with GDPR is supported by privacy and cookie policies, but incident response readiness is unclear.

Recommendations

  1. Obtain and deploy a valid SSL/TLS certificate immediately to enable HTTPS across the entire site.
  2. Enable and enforce modern TLS protocols (TLS 1.2 or 1.3) and disable outdated protocols.
  3. Implement HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS) with includeSubDomains and preload directives.
  4. Publish clear security and incident response policies including contact channels for reporting issues.
  5. Regularly audit and update security headers and enable OCSP stapling for certificate validation.
  6. Enhance transparency by providing a vulnerability disclosure policy or security.txt file.
  7. Maintain and monitor privacy compliance with GDPR and update cookie consent mechanisms as needed.
  8. Improve performance monitoring and optimization to ensure fast and reliable user experience.

Contact details published on the site

Addresses
Technical notes

Notes

The website infrastructure is based on Microsoft IIS 10.0 with ASP.NET, supported by a CDN (CloudFront) for content delivery. The use of TerminalFour CMS indicates a mature content management environment tailored for large institutions. JavaScript libraries like jQuery and GSAP provide interactive and animation capabilities. The site is mobile optimized and accessible with semantic HTML and ARIA labels. However, the lack of HTTPS and modern TLS protocols is a major technical debt and security risk. Performance data is missing, suggesting a need for monitoring. SEO and metadata are well implemented, including Open Graph and Twitter cards for social sharing.
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. 81/100Low25 findingsView report
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