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Security report for rub.de

Ruhr-Universität Bochum · Education · Germany

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

Security score

74/100

Risk levelMedium

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

Ruhr-Universität Bochum is a large, well-established German university with a strong focus on education, research, and societal impact. The website reflects a mature digital presence with comprehensive content targeting students, researchers, alumni, and partners. The technical infrastructure is modern, leveraging Drupal 10 CMS and privacy-conscious analytics via Matomo. Security posture is solid with HTTPS and privacy best practices, though explicit security policies and incident response information are not publicly detailed. Overall, the site is professional, trustworthy, and compliant with GDPR requirements.

Scanned

NIS2 and GDPR posture

GDPR outside view
28/ 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

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.

    • Critical

      EU business without adequate privacy measures

      EU businesses are subject to strict GDPR requirements

      What to do: Implement comprehensive GDPR compliance including privacy policy, cookie consent, and data protection measures

    • 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

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Keep watching rub.de

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.

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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
90
Security headers
70
Email security
83
DNS health
75
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
28
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 university holds a strong market position in the German higher education sector, emphasizing interdisciplinary research and innovation transfer. It maintains partnerships such as UA Ruhr and WORLDFACTORY, enhancing its ecosystem. The business model is public education and research funding, with a large student body and active research projects. The website supports multiple target audiences with clear navigation and multilingual options. Growth indicators include active news, events, and sustainability initiatives.

Security posture

The site enforces HTTPS and disables cookies in analytics to respect user privacy. Matomo analytics is configured with Do Not Track enabled. No exposed sensitive data or vulnerable libraries were detected. However, the absence of a public security policy or vulnerability disclosure page limits transparency. Security headers are partially inferred but not explicitly confirmed. Incident response contact channels are not found. Overall, security maturity is good but could be improved with published policies and security.txt.

Recommendations

  1. Publish a dedicated security policy and incident response information on the website.
  2. Implement and document standard security headers explicitly (e.g., X-Frame-Options, X-Content-Type-Options).
  3. Consider adding a security.txt file to facilitate vulnerability reporting.
  4. Enhance contact information visibility, including security and data protection officer contacts.
  5. Maintain and regularly audit third-party libraries and analytics configurations for vulnerabilities.

Contact details published on the site

Addresses
Site observations

Automated reading of the public site. Ratings are indicative.

Business

Company
Ruhr-Universität Bochum
Description
Die Ruhr-Universität Bochum ist eine große deutsche Universität, die seit 60 Jahren den Wandel im Ruhrgebiet fördert. Sie bietet vielfältige Studiengänge, Forschung, Transfer und gesellschaftlich relevante Themen mit Fokus auf Diversität, Nachhaltigkeit und Digitalisierung.
Key services
Studium, Forschung, Transfer, Beratung und Unterstützung, Internationalisierung
Content quality
excellent
Branding
consistent

Technology

Stack
Drupal 10, Matomo Analytics, VIMP Video Player, Handlebars.js, Modernizr
Frameworks
Drupal CMS
Performance
moderate
Mobile
good
Accessibility
good
SEO
good

Security

Observed score
85/100
Good practices seen
  • HTTPS enforced
  • Disable cookies in Matomo analytics
  • Do Not Track enabled
  • No exposed sensitive data in HTML
  • No vulnerable libraries detected

Analytics and tracking

Services
Matomo
Tracking level
minimal
Privacy practices
good

Advertising

Tracking pixels
Matomo
Marketing tools
Matomo Analytics
Transparency
basic

Site quality

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

Key observations

  1. Website is fully accessible with no blocking or WAF challenges.
  2. Content is rich, professionally designed, and well structured.
  3. Strong focus on education, research, and transfer activities.
  4. Good privacy and cookie compliance with opt-in mechanisms.
  5. No contact emails or phone numbers explicitly found in the HTML content provided.
  6. Social media presence is strong with official accounts on Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, and BlueSky.
  7. No visible forms collecting personal data on the front page content.
  8. No explicit security or incident response policies published on the main site.
  9. Use of modern web technologies and CMS (Drupal 10).
  10. No suspicious or malicious content detected.
Technical notes

Notes

The website uses Drupal 10 CMS with modern front-end technologies including Handlebars.js and Modernizr. Video content is served via VIMP player. Analytics are handled by Matomo with privacy-conscious settings. The site is mobile-optimized and accessible with good SEO practices. Hosting appears to be via academic infrastructure (DFN). Performance is moderate with room for optimization. The site structure is clear and navigation is user-friendly.
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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