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Security report for thebowtimes.com

The Bow Times · Media · United States

Medium risk. 9 critical or high findings in Security headers, GDPR outside view and 2 other checks.

Security score

50/100

Risk levelMedium

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

The Bow Times is a small local newspaper serving the communities of Bow, Dunbarton, and Hopkinton in New Hampshire. Established in 2015, it provides free news and community information, positioning itself as a trusted source for local residents. The website is built on WordPress using the Divi theme, with a moderate technical infrastructure that supports good mobile optimization and basic SEO. Social media presence is primarily on Facebook, and contact information is clearly provided, enhancing business credibility. From a security perspective, the website employs HTTPS and has domain transfer protections in place, but lacks advanced security headers and DNSSEC, which could improve its security posture. There are no visible privacy or cookie policies, which is a compliance gap that should be addressed. No incident response or vulnerability disclosure information is available, indicating room for improvement in security transparency. Overall, the website is functional, safe, and professional for its intended audience, but would benefit from enhanced privacy compliance and security best practices to strengthen trust and regulatory adherence.

Scanned

NIS2 and GDPR posture

GDPR outside view
35/ 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

9 findings rated critical or high. Fix these first.

  1. 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';…

  2. GDPR outside view

    These are the privacy signals visitors and data protection authorities look for under GDPR.

    • High

      No Privacy Policy found

      GDPR requires a clear and accessible privacy policy

      What to do: Add a comprehensive privacy policy page and link to it prominently

    • 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

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

Keep watching thebowtimes.com

This scan found 24 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
15
Email security
85
DNS health
70
Network security
20
GDPR outside view
35
Average
50

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 Bow Times operates as a community-focused media outlet with a free newspaper business model. Its market position is niche, targeting specific towns in New Hampshire, which allows it to cater content and advertising to local interests. The business model likely relies on local advertising revenue and community engagement. The website's use of WordPress and Divi theme suggests a cost-effective digital presence. The presence of submission and ad information pages indicates active community involvement and monetization through ads. The company appears to maintain a straightforward partnership ecosystem, with no evident subsidiaries or parent companies. Growth indicators are limited but the domain age and consistent branding suggest stable operations.

Security posture

The website demonstrates a basic security posture with HTTPS enabled and domain transfer protection. However, the absence of DNSSEC and security headers such as Content-Security-Policy, X-Frame-Options, and X-XSS-Protection reduces its defense-in-depth. No exposed sensitive data or vulnerable libraries were detected in the provided content. The lack of a security.txt or vulnerability disclosure policy limits transparency and incident response readiness. Privacy compliance is weak due to missing privacy and cookie policies. Overall, the security maturity is moderate but could be significantly improved with standard best practices and compliance measures.

Recommendations

  1. Enable DNSSEC on the domain to enhance DNS security and prevent spoofing.
  2. Implement standard security headers (CSP, X-Frame-Options, X-XSS-Protection) to mitigate common web attacks.
  3. Publish comprehensive privacy and cookie policies with clear GDPR compliance statements.
  4. Add a security.txt file and vulnerability disclosure policy to improve transparency and incident response.
  5. Regularly update WordPress core, themes, and plugins to minimize vulnerabilities.

Contact details published on the site

Addresses
Site observations

Automated reading of the public site. Ratings are indicative.

Business

Company
The Bow Times
Description
A Free Newspaper for Bow, Dunbarton and Hopkinton, New Hampshire
Key services
News publication, Community information dissemination, Advertising space (ads), Submissions for content
Content quality
good
Branding
consistent

Technology

Stack
WordPress 6.8.2, Divi Theme v4.27.4, jQuery 3.7.1, Social Pug plugin (social sharing)
Frameworks
WordPress
Platforms
Web
Performance
moderate
Mobile
good
Accessibility
basic
SEO
basic

Security

Observed score
70/100
Good practices seen
  • HTTPS enabled
  • Domain status clientTransferProhibited

Analytics and tracking

Tracking level
minimal
Privacy practices
poor

Advertising

Marketing tools
Social Pug (social sharing plugin)
Transparency
basic

Site quality

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

Key observations

  1. Website is a local community newspaper for Bow, Dunbarton, and Hopkinton, NH
  2. Uses WordPress CMS with Divi theme and social sharing plugin
  3. Contact info including phone, email, and physical address clearly displayed
  4. No privacy, cookie, or terms of service policies found
  5. No explicit security policies or incident response info available
  6. No vulnerability disclosure or security.txt found
  7. Social media presence limited to Facebook
  8. No analytics or tracking scripts detected
  9. No advertising networks or affiliate programs detected
  10. Website content is safe and suitable for general audiences
Technical notes

Notes

The website uses a modern CMS (WordPress 6.8.2) with the Divi theme, a popular and flexible theme for content presentation. It leverages jQuery and a social sharing plugin (Social Pug). Hosting is provided by NameCheap, with domain registration dating back to 2015, indicating a stable infrastructure. Performance is moderate with good mobile optimization but basic accessibility and SEO features. The site lacks advanced analytics or tracking tools, which may limit marketing insights but also reduces privacy concerns. Technical debt appears low, but the absence of security headers and DNSSEC indicates areas for modernization and risk reduction.
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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