Evidence review
What to inspect before changing anything
Start with the delivered website and the real user journey. Record the current state so the team can distinguish an observed problem from an assumption and compare the same surface after deployment.
- 01Review every header check and delivered value
- 02Distinguish missing, partial and effective controls
- 03Identify protections outside public header scope
Implementation
A practical improvement plan
Make the smallest coherent change that solves the observed problem. Keep normal code review, accessibility, security and product checks in the loop instead of optimizing for the scan alone.
- 01Configure headers for the actual application
- 02Test policies before strict enforcement
- 03Complete repository and behavior testing separately
Verification
How to verify the result
Verification should test the intended outcome and the most likely regression. Use the production delivery path whenever headers, caching, rendering or third-party services affect the result.
- 01Fetch the production main document
- 02Exercise integrations under the new policy
- 03Confirm security changes do not alter the footprint score
Common pitfall
A shortcut to avoid
A high header score is not a penetration test and cannot establish backend or business-logic security.
Further reading
Primary guidance and references
These sources provide standards, security guidance or the interpretation framework used to keep this guide bounded. Product-specific implementation still requires review in the actual codebase.