Skip to main content

Is researchgate.net a Scam? Security Check Results - ResearchGate GmbH Reviews

R

Is researchgate.net Safe? Security Analysis for ResearchGate GmbH

Check if researchgate.net is a scam or legitimate. Free security scan and reviews.

EducationGermanylarge
Cloudflare Turnstile CAPTCHAJavaScriptSVG graphicsHTML5CSS3
Analyzed 8/1/2025Completed 10:11:34 AM
57
Security Score
MEDIUM RISK

AI Summary

ResearchGate GmbH operates a leading academic social networking platform designed to facilitate collaboration and knowledge sharing among researchers and scientists worldwide. The platform's core services include research paper sharing, academic networking, and collaborative tools tailored for the scientific community. Despite its significant market presence and established brand since 2008, the current website content is inaccessible due to a Cloudflare Web Application Firewall (WAF) security challenge, which blocks direct content access and analysis. Technically, the website employs advanced security measures such as Cloudflare's Turnstile CAPTCHA to mitigate automated threats, indicating a mature security posture in terms of bot protection. However, the inability to access the full site content limits the assessment of its broader technical infrastructure, performance, and compliance features. The absence of visible privacy, cookie, or terms of service policies in the accessible content further constrains evaluation of regulatory adherence. From a security perspective, while the use of Cloudflare WAF is a positive indicator of proactive defense, the lack of accessible security headers, SSL configuration details, and incident response information prevents a comprehensive security posture evaluation. The missing WHOIS data raises concerns about domain registration transparency, although this may be due to privacy protection services or registry data unavailability. Overall, the website's risk assessment is limited by access restrictions, resulting in a low AI score. Strategic recommendations include enabling access past the WAF for full security and compliance audits, publishing clear privacy and cookie policies, and ensuring transparent domain registration information to enhance trust and credibility.

Detected Technologies

Cloudflare Turnstile CAPTCHAJavaScriptSVG graphicsHTML5CSS3

🧠AI Business Intelligence

Technology stack, business insights, and market analysis powered by AI.

Business Intelligence

Market & Strategic Analysis

ResearchGate GmbH is positioned as a major player in the academic and research networking sector, targeting researchers, scientists, and academics globally. Its business model revolves around providing a digital platform for research collaboration, paper sharing, and professional networking, generating value through user engagement and potentially premium services. The company benefits from a strong brand reputation and a large user base, which supports its market leadership. Competitive advantages include a specialized focus on the academic community and integration of collaboration tools that differentiate it from general social networks. Revenue streams likely include subscription services, advertising, and partnerships with academic institutions or publishers. The absence of visible contact or partnership information in the accessible content limits deeper insights into its ecosystem and growth strategies. Strategically, ResearchGate should focus on enhancing transparency and compliance visibility to maintain user trust and meet evolving regulatory requirements. Strengthening incident response communication and publishing vulnerability disclosure policies could further solidify its security posture and stakeholder confidence.

Security Posture Analysis

Comprehensive Security Assessment

The current security posture assessment is constrained by the Cloudflare WAF challenge page, which prevents direct inspection of security headers, SSL/TLS configurations, and potential vulnerabilities. The presence of Cloudflare Turnstile CAPTCHA indicates an advanced bot mitigation strategy, reducing risks from automated attacks. However, no explicit security policies, incident response contacts, or certifications are visible, limiting evaluation of compliance with standards such as GDPR or ISO 27001. No exposed sensitive data or vulnerable libraries were detected due to content blocking. The lack of visible privacy and cookie policies suggests potential compliance gaps. Incident response readiness and data protection officer information are not publicly accessible, which may impact regulatory adherence and user trust. Recommendations include publishing comprehensive security and privacy policies, enabling vulnerability disclosure mechanisms, and providing clear incident response contacts to improve transparency and compliance. Conducting regular security audits and ensuring visible security best practices will enhance the overall security maturity.

Strategic Recommendations

Priority Actions for Security Improvement

1

Enable access past the Cloudflare WAF to allow full website content and security assessment.

Observations

AI-powered comprehensive website and business analysis.

AI-Enhanced Website Analysis

Cloudflare Detected

Page is a Cloudflare security challenge with Turnstile CAPTCHA blocking access to actual content.

Analysis results may be incomplete. For accurate analysis, please contact guard@offseq.com

Business Insights

Company:

ResearchGate GmbH

Description:

ResearchGate is a professional network for researchers and scientists to share papers, ask and answer questions, and find collaborators.

Key Services:
Research collaborationPaper sharingAcademic networking
Branding:

consistent

Technical Stack

Technologies:
Cloudflare Turnstile CAPTCHAJavaScriptSVG graphicsHTML5CSS3

Security Assessment

0

Analytics & Tracking

Advertising & Marketing

Website Quality Assessment

Key Observations

1

Website content is blocked by Cloudflare WAF security challenge.

🛡️Security Headers

HTTP security headers analysis and recommendations.

Security Headers

HTTP security headers analysis

45/100
Score

Weak Strict-Transport-Security configuration

LOW

Current value: "max-age=15552000; includeSubDomains; preload"

Missing X-Content-Type-Options header

MEDIUM

Prevents MIME type sniffing

Missing Content-Security-Policy header

HIGH

Controls resources the browser is allowed to load

Missing X-XSS-Protection header

MEDIUM

Legacy XSS protection (deprecated but still recommended)

Weak Referrer-Policy configuration

LOW

Current value: "same-origin"

Missing Permissions-Policy header

MEDIUM

Controls browser features and APIs

👤GDPR Compliance

Privacy and data protection assessment under GDPR regulations.

GDPR Compliance

Privacy and data protection assessment

35/100
Score

No Privacy Policy found

HIGH

GDPR requires a clear and accessible privacy policy

No Cookie Policy found

HIGH

GDPR requires clear information about cookie usage

No Cookie Consent Banner found

HIGH

GDPR requires explicit consent for non-essential cookies

Third-party services without privacy policy

HIGH

Detected services: Cloudflare

GDPR Compliance Analysis

Privacy Policy0% confidence
Cookie Policy0% confidence
Contact Information Found90% confidence
phone

🛡️NIS2 Compliance

Network & Information Security Directive compliance assessment.

NIS2 Compliance

Network & Information Security Directive

2/100
Score

No information security framework found

HIGH

NIS2 requires documented cybersecurity and information security measures

No vulnerability disclosure policy

MEDIUM

NIS2 encourages coordinated vulnerability disclosure

No security policy documentation found

HIGH

NIS2 requires documented cybersecurity governance and risk management

No incident response procedures found

HIGH

NIS2 requires documented incident response and business continuity plans

No business continuity planning found

MEDIUM

NIS2 emphasizes operational resilience and business continuity

No security contact information

HIGH

NIS2 requires clear incident reporting channels

No vulnerability reporting mechanism

MEDIUM

Clear vulnerability reporting supports coordinated disclosure

No NIS2 reference found

LOW

Consider explicitly mentioning NIS2 compliance efforts

Critical sector without clear security compliance

HIGH

Detected sectors: transport, digital

📧Email Security

SPF, DKIM, and DMARC validation and email security assessment.

Email Security

SPF, DKIM, and DMARC validation

87/100
Score

No MTA-STS Policy

MEDIUM

MTA-STS enforces TLS for email delivery

No TLS-RPT Record

LOW

TLS-RPT provides reporting for email TLS issues

SPF
Sender Policy Framework
DKIM
DomainKeys Identified Mail
DMARC
Domain-based Message Authentication
MX Records
Mail Exchange Records
BIMI
Brand Indicators
MTA-STS
Mail Transfer Agent Security
TLS-RPT
TLS Reporting
DNSSEC
DNS Security
SPF Details
Record:
v=spf1 ip4:209.15.209.64/27 ip4:209.15.214.192/28 ip4:209.15.243.112/28 ip4:209.15.247.224/28 ip4:209.15.249.176/28 ip4:209.15.249.224/29 ip4:209.15.250.112/28 ip4:37.44.2.16/28 include:_spf.google.com include:servers.mcsv.net include:mail.zendesk.com inc lude:_spf.salesforce.com ~all
DNS Lookups:3/10
Policy:~all
DKIM Selectors Found
Selector:google(1416-bit rsa)
Selector:k1(1296-bit rsa)
Selector:k2(1416-bit rsa)
DMARC Details
Policy:reject
Aggregate Reports:99aee09c@mxtoolbox.dmarc-report.com
Forensic Reports:authfail@dmarc.researchgate.net

🏆SSL/TLS Security

Certificate validity and encryption analysis.

SSL/TLS Security

Certificate validity and encryption analysis

75/100
Score

SSL Certificate Expires Within 90 Days

MEDIUM

SSL certificate expires in 57 days

Weak SSL Key Length

HIGH

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

Partial SSL/TLS Assessment

LOW

Completed 2 of 4 security checks due to time constraints

Certificate Details

Subject:researchgate.net
Issuer:WE1
Valid Until:9/27/2025 (57 days)
SANs:researchgate.net, *.researchgate.net

OCSP Status

OCSP Stapling Disabled

📊DNS Health

DNS configuration and security assessment.

DNS Health

DNS configuration and security assessment

90/100
Score

DNSSEC Not Enabled

MEDIUM

DNSSEC is not configured for this domain

Domain Registration Details

Domain Age
17 years(mature)
Expiry Risk
low(173 days)
Protection Level
strongDNSSEC OFF

DNS Records

A Records:172.64.146.247, 104.18.41.9
AAAA Records:2606:4700:4400::6812:2909, 2606:4700:4400::ac40:92f7
Name Servers:
marty.ns.cloudflare.com
val.ns.cloudflare.com
MX Records:
5: alt2.aspmx.l.google.com
10: alt4.aspmx.l.google.com
10: alt3.aspmx.l.google.com
5: alt1.aspmx.l.google.com
1: aspmx.l.google.com
SOA:Serial: 2379454160, TTL: 1800s

DNSSEC Status

DNSSEC Not Enabled

DNS Performance

Resolution Time:49ms

SPF Analysis

SPF Record:
v=spf1 ip4:209.15.209.64/27 ip4:209.15.214.192/28 ip4:209.15.243.112/28 ip4:209.15.247.224/28 ip4:209.15.249.176/28 ip4:209.15.249.224/29 ip4:209.15.250.112/28 ip4:37.44.2.16/28 include:_spf.google.com include:servers.mcsv.net include:mail.zendesk.com inc lude:_spf.salesforce.com ~all

Network Security

Port scanning and network exposure analysis.

Network Security

Port scanning and network exposure analysis

100/100
Score

Good Network Security Posture

LOW

No unnecessary services detected on common risky ports

🔧Technical Analysis

Detailed technical findings and analysis from AI assessment.

Technical Analysis

Comprehensive security assessment findings

Additional Findings

The website employs modern web technologies including HTML5, CSS3, SVG graphics, and JavaScript. It uses Cloudflare services for security and content delivery, specifically the Turnstile CAPTCHA for bot mitigation. The hosting infrastructure is likely robust given Cloudflare's involvement, but performance and accessibility cannot be assessed due to content blocking.
No CMS or specific web frameworks are identifiable from the limited HTML content. The site appears mobile responsive based on CSS media queries, but this cannot be confirmed without full content access. SEO and accessibility features are not assessable due to the WAF challenge.
Technical risks include potential over-reliance on WAF blocking which may hinder legitimate user access and complicate security assessments. Modernization opportunities include enhancing transparency and providing accessible compliance documentation.
Analyze Another Website