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Security report for mo.gov

State of Missouri · Government · United States

Medium risk. 3 critical or high findings in GDPR outside view and DNS health.

Security score

74/100

Risk levelMedium

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

The website www.mo.gov serves as the official online portal for the State of Missouri, providing a comprehensive range of information and services to residents, businesses, government employees, and visitors. It functions as a centralized hub for accessing state agencies, online services such as tax filing and license renewals, public safety information, educational resources, and tourism guidance. The site is positioned as an authoritative government resource with a broad target audience encompassing various stakeholder groups within Missouri. Technically, the website is built on the WordPress CMS platform and utilizes common web technologies including jQuery, Google Fonts, RoyalSlider for interactive content, and Google Analytics for user tracking. The site demonstrates moderate performance and good mobile optimization, with basic accessibility features and solid SEO practices. The presence of HTTPS ensures secure communications, although the absence of certain security headers suggests room for improvement in hardening the site against common web threats. From a security perspective, the site enforces HTTPS and avoids exposing sensitive data in its HTML content. However, it lacks explicit security headers and a formal vulnerability disclosure policy or security incident response contact information. Privacy compliance is partially addressed with visible privacy and data policies, but no active cookie consent mechanism is implemented. The WHOIS data is incomplete, lacking registrar and registrant details, which is unusual but mitigated by the .gov domain status and the official nature of the site. Overall, the website presents a trustworthy and professional government portal with good content quality and user experience. Strategic recommendations include enhancing security headers, implementing cookie consent for privacy compliance, publishing vulnerability disclosure information, and improving accessibility features to meet modern standards.

Scanned

NIS2 and GDPR posture

GDPR outside view
53/ 100 · Medium
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

3 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.

    • 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. DNS health

    DNS sends visitors and email to the right servers. Misconfigured records can cause outages or let someone redirect your traffic.

    • High

      Weak SPF Policy

      SPF record has permissive policy allowing any server to send email

      What to do: Use -all or ~all qualifier for better email security

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

Keep watching mo.gov

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.

Daily monitoring

Recommended

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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
85
Email security
60
DNS health
60
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
53
Average
74

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

The State of Missouri's official website operates as a critical government service platform, delivering essential information and services to a wide audience including residents, businesses, and government personnel. Its market position is that of a primary authoritative source for state-related information, supported by partnerships with various state departments and agencies. The business model is non-commercial, focusing on public service delivery and transparency. Revenue streams are not applicable, but the site supports government operational efficiency and citizen engagement. The partnership ecosystem is extensive, linking to multiple official state domains and external government resources, reinforcing its role as a central information hub. Growth indicators include active content updates and integration of modern web technologies. Strategic observations highlight the importance of maintaining security and privacy compliance to uphold public trust.

Security posture

The security posture of www.mo.gov is solid in terms of HTTPS enforcement and absence of exposed sensitive data. However, the lack of security headers such as Content-Security-Policy, X-Frame-Options, and Strict-Transport-Security represents a gap that could expose the site to certain web-based attacks. The absence of a published vulnerability disclosure policy and incident response contact reduces transparency and may delay response to security incidents. Privacy compliance is partially met with privacy and data policies, but the lack of a cookie consent mechanism is a compliance risk, especially for users from jurisdictions with strict privacy laws. Overall, the site demonstrates a moderate security maturity level appropriate for a government portal but would benefit from enhancements in security best practices and compliance documentation.

Recommendations

  1. Implement comprehensive security headers including Content-Security-Policy, X-Content-Type-Options, X-Frame-Options, and Strict-Transport-Security to enhance protection against common web attacks.
  2. Deploy a clear cookie consent mechanism to improve privacy compliance and user transparency.
  3. Publish a vulnerability disclosure policy or security.txt file to facilitate responsible reporting of security issues.
  4. Provide explicit incident response contact information to improve security incident management and user trust.
  5. Enhance accessibility features to meet or exceed WCAG standards, ensuring inclusivity for all users.
Site observations

Automated reading of the public site. Ratings are indicative.

Business

Company
State of Missouri
Description
Official website of the State of Missouri providing information and services for residents, businesses, visitors, and government entities.
Key services
State agency information, Online services (taxes, licenses, job search, etc.), Public safety and health information, Tourism and outdoor activities, Government transparency and open data
Content quality
good
Branding
consistent

Technology

Stack
jQuery, Google Fonts, RoyalSlider, Google Analytics, Google Maps API, WordPress
Platforms
WordPress
Performance
moderate
Mobile
good
Accessibility
basic
SEO
good

Security

Observed score
85/100
Good practices seen
  • HTTPS enforced
  • No exposed sensitive data in HTML
  • Secure form submission via HTTPS

Analytics and tracking

Services
Google Analytics, GoSquared
Tracking level
moderate
Privacy practices
basic

Advertising

Tracking pixels
GoSquared
Transparency
basic

Site quality

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

Key observations

  1. Official Missouri state government website with extensive public service information.
  2. Content is well-structured with clear navigation and categorized services.
  3. No signs of adult or inappropriate content.
  4. Uses WordPress CMS with common government web technologies.
  5. No visible security headers detected in HTML source; HTTPS is enforced.
  6. No explicit contact emails or phone numbers found in the HTML content.
  7. Privacy and data policies are present but no explicit cookie consent mechanism.
  8. No terms of service or security incident response information found.
  9. WHOIS data is incomplete and lacks registrar and registrant details.
  10. Multiple trusted external government and partner domains linked.
Technical notes

Notes

The website leverages WordPress CMS with a combination of JavaScript libraries such as jQuery and RoyalSlider to deliver interactive and dynamic content. Google Fonts are used for typography, and Google Analytics alongside GoSquared provide user behavior tracking and analytics. The site is hosted with HTTPS enabled, ensuring encrypted data transmission. Performance is moderate, with room for optimization in loading speed and resource management. Mobile optimization is good, supporting responsive design principles. Accessibility is basic, indicating potential for improvement to comply with accessibility standards. The technical stack is modern and widely supported, but the absence of certain security headers and explicit privacy consent mechanisms indicates technical debt in security and compliance areas. Opportunities exist for modernization and enhanced security hardening to reduce risk and improve user experience.
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

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