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Security report for thedailystar.net

The Daily Star · Media · Bangladesh

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

Security score

74/100

Risk levelMedium

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

The Daily Star is a leading English-language daily newspaper in Bangladesh, providing 24/7 national and international news coverage. The website serves a broad audience interested in news, business, sports, entertainment, and multimedia content. It operates a professional online news platform with advertising and e-paper subscription models. Technically, the site uses Drupal CMS and integrates multiple analytics and advertising technologies such as Google Analytics, Microsoft Clarity, Chartbeat, and Google Ad Manager. The website is well-optimized for mobile and accessibility and employs modern security headers and HTTPS encryption. However, it lacks explicit cookie consent mechanisms and a published security or incident response policy. WHOIS data is unavailable, which slightly reduces trust but does not detract from the site's legitimacy given its established brand and consistent online presence.

Scanned

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

5 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 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 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

  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 SSL Key Length

      SSL certificate uses 256-bit key, which is considered weak

      What to do: Use at least 2048-bit RSA or 256-bit ECC key

      • CWE-326
      • OWASP A04:2025
      • Mozilla TLS: Mozilla Server Side TLS 6.0 intermediate: rsa_key_size 2048

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

Keep watching thedailystar.net

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
65
Security headers
40
Email security
100
DNS health
85
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
53
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 Daily Star holds a strong market position as Bangladesh's leading English daily newspaper. Its business model relies on advertising revenue and digital subscriptions via its e-paper. The company targets a general audience interested in credible news and multimedia content. The website's professional design, structured data, and active social media presence support its credibility. The absence of WHOIS data is likely due to registry policies or privacy protection but does not indicate suspicious activity. The site maintains partnerships with major advertising and analytics providers, enhancing its monetization and audience insights capabilities.

Security posture

The website demonstrates a mature security posture with HTTPS enforcement and multiple security headers such as Content-Security-Policy and Strict-Transport-Security. It avoids exposing sensitive data and uses anonymized IP tracking in analytics. However, it lacks a publicly available security policy, incident response contact, and vulnerability disclosure program, which are recommended for transparency and readiness. The absence of a cookie consent banner may also pose compliance risks under GDPR and similar regulations. Overall, the site is secure but could improve compliance and transparency aspects.

Recommendations

  1. Implement a clear cookie consent mechanism to comply with GDPR and other privacy regulations.
  2. Publish a security policy and provide incident response contact information to enhance transparency and trust.
  3. Establish a vulnerability disclosure program or security.txt file to encourage responsible reporting of security issues.
  4. Regularly review and audit third-party scripts to minimize risks from external dependencies.
  5. Enhance privacy policy details to explicitly address GDPR, CCPA, and data retention practices.

Contact details published on the site

Addresses
Site observations

Automated reading of the public site. Ratings are indicative.

Business

Company
The Daily Star
Description
The Daily Star, Bangladeshi leading English newspaper updates 24/7 national & international breaking News. Get latest news from credible English newspaper.
Key services
News publishing, E-paper subscription, Multimedia content, Advertising
Content quality
excellent
Branding
consistent

Technology

Stack
Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager, Microsoft Clarity, DoubleClick for Publishers (Google Ad Manager), Chartbeat, Facebook Pixel, jQuery, Drupal CMS
Frameworks
Drupal
Platforms
Web
Performance
moderate
Mobile
good
Accessibility
good
SEO
good

Security

Observed score
85/100
Good practices seen
  • HTTPS enforced
  • Security headers present
  • No exposed sensitive data in HTML
  • Use of secure cookies (implied)
  • Use of modern analytics with anonymize IP

Analytics and tracking

Services
Google Analytics, Microsoft Clarity, Chartbeat
Tracking level
moderate
Privacy practices
basic

Advertising

Ad networks
Google Ad Manager (DoubleClick)
Tracking pixels
Facebook Pixel, Microsoft Clarity, Chartbeat
Transparency
good

Site quality

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

Key observations

  1. Website is a professional news media outlet with extensive content and multimedia.
  2. No WHOIS data available from raw output; domain appears active and legitimate.
  3. No explicit privacy cookie consent mechanism detected despite privacy policy presence.
  4. Use of multiple third-party analytics and advertising scripts.
  5. Good SEO and accessibility practices observed.
  6. No security policy or incident response contact found.
  7. No vulnerability disclosure or security.txt found.
  8. Contact information includes phone and physical address in Bangladesh.
  9. Social media presence is strong with official Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube links.
  10. No adult or questionable content detected.
Technical notes

Notes

The Daily Star website is built on Drupal CMS and leverages a modern technology stack including Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager, Microsoft Clarity, Chartbeat, and Google Ad Manager for advertising. The site uses responsive design techniques and is optimized for mobile devices. Performance is moderate with asynchronous loading of scripts and use of CDN-hosted fonts and libraries. Accessibility features such as skip links and ARIA roles are present. SEO is well addressed with meta tags, Open Graph, and JSON-LD structured data. The site could benefit from further performance tuning and enhanced privacy compliance features.
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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