Skip to main content

Security report for nih.gov

National Institutes of Health · Government · United States

Low risk. 3 critical or high findings in GDPR outside view and SSL/TLS.

Security score

81/100

Risk levelLow

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

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is a premier U.S. government medical research agency under the Department of Health and Human Services. The website serves a broad audience including the public, researchers, medical professionals, and educators by providing authoritative health information, research funding opportunities, clinical trial resources, and training programs. NIH holds a strong market position as a leading federal health research institution with extensive initiatives advancing biomedical science and public health. Technically, the NIH website is built on Drupal 10 with integration of modern web technologies including Google Tag Manager and Analytics, and follows the U.S. Web Design System for accessibility and responsive design. The site demonstrates excellent performance, mobile optimization, and SEO practices, ensuring a high-quality user experience. From a security perspective, the site enforces HTTPS, employs privacy and vulnerability disclosure policies, and uses best practices for external linking and data protection. No critical vulnerabilities or exposed sensitive data were detected. However, explicit security headers could be confirmed and a cookie consent mechanism could be added to enhance compliance. Overall, NIH's website reflects a mature, trustworthy, and authoritative digital presence consistent with its government status. The lack of WHOIS data is typical for government domains and does not detract from its legitimacy. Strategic recommendations include enhancing security header transparency, implementing cookie consent, and adding terms of service documentation to further strengthen compliance and user trust.

Scanned

This is an earlier scan of nih.gov. View the latest report

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. 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.

    • High

      SSL Certificate Expires Soon

      SSL certificate expires in 25 days

      What to do: Renew SSL certificate before expiration

      • NIS2 21(2)(h)
      • IR 2024/2690 9.2(c): Implementing Regulation (EU) 2024/2690, Annex point 9.2(c): Cryptography
      • NIST SC-17: NIST SP 800-53 Rev. 5 SC-17: Public Key Infrastructure Certificates

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

Keep watching nih.gov

This scan found 15 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. The full timeline opens with your unlock code.

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
75
Security headers
85
Email security
85
DNS health
85
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
53
Average
81

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

NIH operates as a government entity focused on medical research and public health. Its competitive advantage lies in federal funding authority, extensive research infrastructure, and authoritative health information dissemination. Revenue streams are government appropriations and grants. Target customers include researchers, healthcare providers, patients, and the general public. Growth indicators include ongoing initiatives like the HEAL Initiative and RECOVER program. The partnership ecosystem includes other government agencies and health organizations. NIH's operations are stable with a strong reputation and extensive digital resources supporting its mission.

Security posture

NIH demonstrates a strong security posture with enforced HTTPS, privacy policies, and vulnerability disclosure mechanisms. No exposed sensitive data or vulnerable libraries were found. The site uses secure external linking practices and integrates trusted analytics tools. Compliance with federal security standards is implied though explicit security headers could be better documented. Incident response contacts are not explicitly listed but vulnerability disclosure is available. Overall, NIH maintains a robust security culture appropriate for a federal health agency.

Recommendations

  1. Confirm and explicitly implement security headers such as Content-Security-Policy, X-Frame-Options, and X-Content-Type-Options.
  2. Implement a cookie consent banner or mechanism to comply with privacy regulations and enhance user transparency.
  3. Add a clearly accessible Terms of Service page to complete legal documentation.
  4. Publish explicit incident response contact information to improve security communication.
  5. Regularly audit third-party scripts and analytics tools for security and privacy compliance.

Contact details published on the site

Addresses
Site observations

Automated reading of the public site. Ratings are indicative.

Business

Company
National Institutes of Health
Description
The National Institutes of Health (NIH), a part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, is the nation’s medical research agency — making important discoveries that improve health and save lives.
Key services
Medical research, Health information dissemination, Grants and funding, Research training, Clinical trials, Public health education
Content quality
excellent
Branding
consistent

Technology

Stack
Drupal 10, Google Tag Manager, Google Analytics, Pinterest JS, USA.gov search integration
Frameworks
Drupal CMS, US Web Design System (USWDS)
Performance
fast
Mobile
excellent
Accessibility
excellent
SEO
excellent

Security

Observed score
90/100
Good practices seen
  • HTTPS enforced
  • No exposed sensitive data in HTML
  • External links use rel='noopener nofollow noreferrer'
  • Privacy and vulnerability disclosure policies linked

Analytics and tracking

Services
Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager, Digital Analytics Program (DAP)
Tracking level
moderate
Privacy practices
good

Advertising

Tracking pixels
Digital Analytics Program (DAP)
Transparency
good

Site quality

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

Key observations

  1. Official U.S. government website with .gov domain
  2. Comprehensive health and research information
  3. Strong branding and consistent design
  4. No signs of malicious or suspicious content
  5. Good security posture with HTTPS and privacy policies
  6. No WHOIS data available due to privacy or registry restrictions
  7. No cookie consent mechanism detected
  8. No terms of service page detected
  9. Multiple trusted external government and health domains linked
  10. Social media presence on major platforms
Technical notes

Notes

The NIH website is built on a modern Drupal 10 CMS platform, leveraging the U.S. Web Design System for consistent and accessible UI. It integrates Google Tag Manager and Analytics for data collection and performance monitoring. The site is mobile-optimized and SEO-friendly with comprehensive metadata and Open Graph tags. Performance is fast with asynchronous script loading. Technical risks are minimal, though reliance on multiple third-party scripts requires ongoing monitoring. The infrastructure supports a large enterprise-level government agency with high availability and security standards.
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. 49/100 −33High38 findingsView report
  2. 82/100Low21 findingsView report
Reviews of this site

Share your experience with nih.gov. 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 nih.gov.

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.