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Security report for pnac.org

Pontifical North American College · Education · United States

High risk. 9 critical or high findings in GDPR outside view, SSL/TLS and 1 other check.

Security score

43/100

Risk levelHigh

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

The Pontifical North American College is a well-established non-profit educational institution focused on priestly formation and continuing theological education in Rome. The website reflects a mature organization with a clear mission and target audience of American seminarians and priests. The institution maintains a professional online presence with consistent branding and active social media channels. Technically, the website is built on WordPress with common plugins and frameworks such as Bootstrap and WooCommerce, hosted on Amazon AWS infrastructure. However, the site suffers from slow load times and lacks a valid SSL certificate, which critically impacts its security posture. No privacy or cookie policies are present, indicating gaps in compliance with modern privacy standards. Security headers and advanced protections are absent, increasing risk exposure. Overall, while the business credibility and content quality are good, the security and privacy compliance require urgent improvements to protect users and enhance trust.

Scanned

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

9 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

  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"

    • 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';…

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Keep watching pnac.org

This scan found 25 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
0
Security headers
15
Email security
70
DNS health
75
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
0
Average
43

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 organization operates in the education and non-profit sectors, providing specialized religious formation and residence services. Its market position is strong due to its long history and unique niche. Revenue likely comes from donations, support campaigns, and possibly tuition or fees for continuing education programs. The website supports engagement through newsletters, social media, and visitor services. The partnership ecosystem includes social media platforms and content distribution channels like Issuu. Growth indicators include active content updates and multiple program offerings. Strategic observations suggest focusing on digital modernization and enhanced security to maintain reputation and donor confidence.

Security posture

The current security maturity is low due to the absence of HTTPS and SSL certificate, lack of security headers, and no evidence of incident response or vulnerability disclosure policies. These gaps expose the site and its users to risks such as data interception and phishing. The lack of privacy and cookie policies also indicates non-compliance with GDPR and related regulations. The DNS configuration is standard but lacks DNSSEC. Incident response readiness appears minimal. To improve, the organization should prioritize SSL implementation, security header deployment, and formalize privacy and security policies.

Recommendations

  1. Obtain and deploy a valid SSL/TLS certificate to enable HTTPS across the entire site immediately.
  2. Implement and publish comprehensive privacy and cookie policies to comply with GDPR and other privacy regulations.
  3. Add security headers such as Content-Security-Policy, X-Frame-Options, and X-Content-Type-Options to harden the site.
  4. Enable DNSSEC and CAA records to improve DNS security and certificate issuance control.
  5. Establish a vulnerability disclosure policy and incident response contact to enhance security transparency and readiness.
Technical notes

Notes

The website uses a mature WordPress CMS with Bootstrap and jQuery frameworks, supported by WooCommerce for e-commerce capabilities. Hosting is on Amazon AWS, indicated by DNS nameservers. The site includes Google Tag Manager and Google Analytics for tracking. Performance is slow with a high load time and many resources, suggesting optimization opportunities. Mobile responsiveness is good, but accessibility features are basic. SEO is supported by Yoast SEO plugin with proper meta tags and structured data. Technical risks include outdated or missing SSL, lack of security headers, and no session resumption or OCSP stapling, which could impact user trust and search rankings.
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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