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Security report for ucdenver.edu

University of Colorado Denver · Education · United States

Medium risk. 7 critical or high findings in Security headers, GDPR outside view and 2 other checks.

Security score

65/100

Risk levelMedium

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

University of Colorado Denver is a large, well-established public urban research university located in Denver, Colorado. It offers a broad range of undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral degree programs across multiple colleges and schools. The institution targets prospective and current students, parents, faculty, and alumni, positioning itself as a premier educational provider in the state. The website reflects a professional and comprehensive digital presence with clear branding and extensive contact information.

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

7 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 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

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

Keep watching ucdenver.edu

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.

Daily monitoring

Recommended

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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
67
Security headers
15
Email security
85
DNS health
70
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
53
Average
65

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

CU Denver operates within the education sector, focusing on higher education and research. Its business model revolves around providing academic programs and student services to a diverse learner base. The university maintains partnerships with affiliated campuses within the University of Colorado system, enhancing its market reach and collaborative opportunities. The website's content and structure indicate a mature organization with a strong emphasis on student engagement, admissions, and academic excellence.

Security posture

The website employs HTTPS with a strong SSL configuration and uses modern security best practices such as Google Tag Manager and Siteimprove Analytics for monitoring. While explicit security headers were not fully confirmed in the HTML, the overall posture is strong with no visible vulnerabilities or exposed sensitive data. However, the absence of a dedicated security policy or incident response contact suggests room for improvement in transparency and readiness. The site does not currently provide a vulnerability disclosure policy or security.txt file.

Recommendations

  1. Implement and verify comprehensive security headers including X-Frame-Options and X-Content-Type-Options to enhance protection against clickjacking and MIME sniffing.
  2. Publish a dedicated security policy page and provide clear incident response contact channels to improve transparency and preparedness.
  3. Develop and maintain a vulnerability disclosure program or security.txt file to encourage responsible reporting of security issues.
  4. Regularly audit third-party scripts and analytics tools to mitigate risks from external dependencies.
  5. Enhance cookie consent mechanisms to ensure full compliance with privacy regulations and improve user trust.

Contact details published on the site

Addresses
Legal name
University of Colorado Denver
Site observations

Automated reading of the public site. Ratings are indicative.

Business

Company
University of Colorado Denver
Description
University of Colorado Denver, located in Denver, CO offers more than 125 degrees in 7 schools and colleges, educating people who are serious about their future!
Key services
Undergraduate and graduate degree programs, Admissions and enrollment services, Student life and support services, Career services, Housing and dining, International admissions
Content quality
excellent
Branding
consistent

Technology

Stack
Bootstrap 5, jQuery, Select2, FontAwesome, Google Tag Manager, Siteimprove Analytics, Telerik Sitefinity CMS
Frameworks
Bootstrap 5, Sitefinity CMS
Platforms
Web
Performance
moderate
Mobile
good
Accessibility
good
SEO
good

Security

Observed score
85/100
Good practices seen
  • HTTPS enforced
  • No exposed sensitive data in HTML
  • Use of Google Tag Manager and Siteimprove for monitoring

Analytics and tracking

Services
Siteimprove Analytics, Google Tag Manager
Tracking level
moderate
Privacy practices
good

Advertising

Tracking pixels
Siteimprove Analytics
Marketing tools
Siteimprove Analytics
Transparency
basic

Site quality

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

Key observations

  1. Website is professionally designed and well maintained
  2. Comprehensive contact information and organizational details provided
  3. Use of modern web technologies and analytics tools
  4. No signs of blocking or WAF interference
  5. Strong branding and consistent messaging
  6. No visible security vulnerabilities or exposed sensitive data
  7. No explicit privacy or security policy pages found in the provided HTML but inferred from policy URLs
  8. Multiple external trusted domains linked, including official university system sites
Technical notes

Notes

The website is built on the Sitefinity CMS platform, leveraging Bootstrap 5 for responsive design and jQuery for interactivity. It integrates third-party libraries such as Select2 for enhanced form controls and FontAwesome for icons. Performance is moderate with good mobile optimization and accessibility features. SEO is supported by proper meta tags, Open Graph data, and structured JSON-LD data. The site uses Google Tag Manager and Siteimprove Analytics for tracking and quality assurance. There is an opportunity to optimize performance further and ensure all security headers are explicitly set.
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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