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Security report for wsu.edu

Washington State University · Education · United States

Medium risk. 7 critical or high findings in Security headers, GDPR outside view and 1 other check.

Security score

70/100

Risk levelMedium

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

Washington State University is a large, well-established public research university with multiple campuses across Washington state and a global online presence. The institution focuses on providing comprehensive education, research opportunities, and community outreach through extension offices and research centers. The website reflects a professional and consistent brand image, targeting students, faculty, researchers, and the broader community. Technically, the site is built on WordPress with a modern design system and integrates multiple analytics and marketing tools. Security posture is generally good with HTTPS enabled and no visible sensitive data exposure, though some improvements in security headers and updated libraries are recommended. Privacy compliance is partial, with no visible cookie consent mechanism, which could be improved to meet regulatory standards. Overall, the site is trustworthy and professionally maintained, supporting the university's mission and market position.

Scanned

This is an earlier scan of wsu.edu. View the latest report

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

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 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

    • 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 wsu.edu

This scan found 21 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
62
Security headers
50
Email security
85
DNS health
85
Network security
100
GDPR outside view
35
Average
70

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

WSU holds a strong market position as a top research university with a broad academic offering and statewide impact. Its business model centers on education, research funding, and community engagement. The university leverages partnerships for fundraising, employee management, and retail services. The website's extensive content and multiple campus highlights indicate a mature digital presence aimed at diverse audiences including prospective and current students, faculty, and the public. Growth indicators include active news updates and integration of online education platforms. Strategic observations suggest continued investment in digital infrastructure and compliance enhancements would benefit the institution.

Security posture

The website demonstrates a mature security posture with HTTPS enforced and no apparent exposure of sensitive information. The use of Google Tag Manager and Facebook Pixel indicates tracking capabilities, but the absence of a cookie consent banner suggests a gap in privacy compliance. The outdated jQuery version may pose some risk if deprecated functions are exploited, and the lack of visible security headers like Content-Security-Policy or X-Frame-Options could be improved. Incident response and security policy information are not publicly available on the homepage, which could hinder transparency and readiness. Overall, the security maturity is good but can be enhanced by adopting best practices in headers, updating libraries, and publishing clear security policies.

Recommendations

  1. Implement a visible cookie consent mechanism to comply with GDPR and other privacy regulations.
  2. Publish detailed security and incident response policies accessible from the website.
  3. Add and configure security headers such as Content-Security-Policy, X-Content-Type-Options, and X-Frame-Options.
  4. Update jQuery and other JavaScript libraries to current supported versions to avoid vulnerabilities.
  5. Provide clear contact information for security incidents and data protection inquiries.
  6. Regularly audit third-party scripts and tracking pixels to ensure privacy compliance and minimize risk.
  7. Enhance transparency around data retention policies and user data handling.
Site observations

Automated reading of the public site. Ratings are indicative.

Business

Company
Washington State University
Description
Washington State University —WSU is a top research university dedicated to solving problems and improving lives 6 campuses11 academic collegesExtension offices in all 39 Washington counties and on the Colville Reservation4 research and extension centers
Key services
Undergraduate and graduate education, Research funding and projects, Extension offices and community outreach, Online education
Content quality
excellent
Branding
consistent

Technology

Stack
WordPress 5.6.2, jQuery 1.12.4, Google Tag Manager, Facebook Pixel, Curator.io, Normalize.css, WSU Design System CSS and JS
Frameworks
WordPress
Platforms
Web
Performance
moderate
Mobile
good
Accessibility
good
SEO
good

Security

Observed score
85/100
Good practices seen
  • HTTPS enabled
  • No exposed sensitive data in HTML
  • Use of Google Tag Manager and Facebook Pixel with async loading

Analytics and tracking

Services
Google Analytics, Facebook Pixel, Apollo Events, Simpli.fi
Tracking level
extensive
Privacy practices
basic

Advertising

Ad networks
Sitescout
Tracking pixels
Facebook Pixel, Apollo Events, Simpli.fi
Marketing tools
Curator.io
Transparency
basic

Site quality

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

Key observations

  1. Website is a well-established university site with multiple campuses
  2. Content is rich, professionally designed, and well-structured
  3. No signs of blocking or WAF challenges
  4. Use of multiple analytics and tracking tools without explicit cookie consent banner
  5. No explicit contact emails or phone numbers found on the homepage HTML
  6. Security headers not explicitly visible in provided data
  7. WHOIS data supports legitimacy and long-term operation
Technical notes

Notes

The website is built on WordPress 5.6.2, utilizing a custom WSU design system with Normalize.css and jQuery 1.12.4. It integrates Google Tag Manager and Facebook Pixel for analytics and marketing. The site loads multiple asynchronously loaded scripts and stylesheets from trusted CDNs. Performance is moderate with good mobile optimization and accessibility features. The site uses multiple Google Tag Manager containers and Facebook Pixel IDs, indicating complex tracking setups. There is no evidence of hosting provider from the HTML, but the domain is well-established. Technical risks include the use of an outdated jQuery version and lack of visible security headers. The site is well-structured with clear navigation and rich content, supporting a positive user experience.
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

Earlier scans of this domain

  1. 70/100Medium29 findingsView report
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