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Security report for steuerchatbot.de

Financial administrations of the federal states and the federal government, represented by the IT steering group · Government · Germany

Medium risk. 5 critical or high findings in GDPR outside view, Email security and 1 other check.

Security score

69/100

Risk levelMedium

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

The website steuerchatbot.de is an official German government service providing a tax chatbot to assist citizens with tax-related questions. It is designed to offer general tax information without providing personalized tax advice, aiming to improve citizen service and reduce workload on tax offices. The service supports multiple languages and is accessible 24/7. The technical infrastructure uses modern web technologies including Bootstrap and JavaScript, embedding the chatbot via an iframe with backend services hosted by IBM Deutschland GmbH and translation services by DeepL GmbH. The site is well-structured, mobile-optimized, and presents comprehensive privacy and terms of use information in modals. Security practices include encrypted data transmission and limited data retention, though explicit security headers are not evident in the provided data. No cookie policy or consent mechanism was found. Contact information is clearly provided with official government addresses, emails, and phone numbers. Overall, the site demonstrates a good balance of usability, compliance, and trustworthiness appropriate for a government digital service.

Scanned

NIS2 and GDPR posture

GDPR outside view
45/ 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

5 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

  2. Email security

    SPF, DKIM and DMARC stop others sending email that looks like it comes from your domain, a common route to phishing and invoice fraud.

    • Critical

      No email authentication configured

      Domain is vulnerable to email spoofing

      What to do: Implement SPF, DKIM, and DMARC immediately

  3. 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

      Weak Protocols Supported

      Server supports weak protocols: TLSv1.1

      What to do: Disable TLS 1.0, TLS 1.1, and all SSL versions

      • CWE-327
      • OWASP A04:2025
      • ASVS V12.1.1

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

Keep watching steuerchatbot.de

This scan found 22 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
77
Security headers
70
Email security
60
DNS health
60
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
45
Average
69

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 tax chatbot service is positioned as a government digital information platform targeting private citizens in Germany seeking tax information. It leverages official tax administration knowledge bases and third-party cloud services to deliver automated responses. The business model is non-commercial, focusing on public service and digital transformation of government services. The multilingual support and 24/7 availability enhance accessibility and inclusiveness. The partnership ecosystem includes IBM Deutschland GmbH for cloud hosting and DeepL GmbH for translation services. The service is likely funded and operated by the federal states and federal government IT steering group. Growth indicators include ongoing chatbot learning and expansion of supported languages. The platform reduces direct inquiries to tax offices, improving operational efficiency.

Security posture

The website demonstrates a moderate security posture with encrypted data transmission and limited data retention policies. The privacy policy is comprehensive and GDPR compliant, emphasizing no collection of personal data in the chatbot. However, the absence of visible security headers such as CSP, HSTS, or X-Frame-Options is a gap. No incident response or vulnerability disclosure information is published, which could be improved. The use of third-party cloud providers introduces data exposure risks, mitigated by encryption and contractual obligations. Overall, the security maturity is appropriate for a government informational service but could benefit from enhanced technical controls and transparency.

Recommendations

  1. Implement and publish a cookie policy with a user consent mechanism to comply with privacy regulations.
  2. Add and enforce security headers such as Content Security Policy (CSP), HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS), and X-Frame-Options to improve protection against common web attacks.
  3. Publish an incident response policy and provide dedicated security contact channels to improve transparency and readiness.
  4. Conduct regular security audits of third-party providers (IBM, DeepL) to ensure compliance with data protection standards.
  5. Enhance accessibility features to meet higher standards and improve user experience for all users.

Contact details published on the site

Addresses
Legal name
Financial administrations of the federal states and the federal government, represented by the IT steering group
Site observations

Automated reading of the public site. Ratings are indicative.

Business

Company
Financial administrations of the federal states and the federal government, represented by the IT steering group
Description
The tax chatbot is an information service for citizens about current tax law in Germany, provided by the states and the federal government. It answers general and specific tax questions without providing tax advice, aiming to improve citizen service and relieve tax offices.
Key services
Automated answers to tax-related questions, Multilingual chatbot support (German, English, French), 24/7 availability for tax information
Content quality
good
Branding
consistent

Technology

Stack
Bootstrap, JavaScript, HTML5, CSS3, iframe embedding, Cloud-based chatbot backend (IBM Deutschland GmbH), DeepL translation service
Frameworks
Bootstrap
Platforms
Web
Performance
moderate
Mobile
good
Accessibility
basic
SEO
poor

Security

Observed score
70/100
Good practices seen
  • Use of HTTPS (implied by privacy policy mention)
  • Encrypted data transmission (SSL/TLS)
  • No personal data requested in chatbot
  • Data retention limited to 30 days
  • Data stored encrypted in cloud

Analytics and tracking

Tracking level
minimal
Privacy practices
good

Advertising

Transparency
poor

Site quality

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

Key observations

  1. Website is a government-provided tax information chatbot service.
  2. Content is fully accessible with no blocking or WAF challenges.
  3. No cookie policy or consent mechanism detected.
  4. Privacy policy and terms of use are presented in modals and are comprehensive.
  5. Contact information is clearly provided with official email and phone.
  6. No analytics or advertising scripts detected.
  7. Multilingual support with German, English, and French languages.
  8. Use of iframe to embed chatbot interface.
  9. No social media links found.
  10. No forms detected on the page.
Technical notes

Notes

The website uses a modern front-end stack with Bootstrap for responsive design and JavaScript for dynamic content and language translation. The chatbot interface is embedded via an iframe, sourcing content from a local index.html with parameters controlling language and features. The site includes custom scripts for browser detection and language management. Performance is moderate, with no heavy external dependencies detected. SEO optimization is minimal, with meta tags present but no Open Graph or structured data. No CMS or hosting provider details are explicitly identified. The site is mobile-optimized and provides a clean user interface with clear navigation. Technical risks include lack of visible security headers and reliance on third-party cloud services without published security attestations.
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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