Homeβ€Ί News & Mediaβ€Ί usatoday.com
Mostly Safe

Yes β€” usatoday.com looks mostly safe

72/ 100 trust score
Industry: News & Media Checked Sep 11, 2026 News & Media average: 66 34 signals

In plain English

USA Today is a legitimate, long-established news site β€” there's no reason to think it's a scam. Our scan turned up some missing pages like about and privacy policy, but that's likely a limitation of the tool, not a sign of trouble. You can trust it for news.

Cross-referenced 34 live signals from Google Safe Browsing, VirusTotal, WHOIS and more on Sep 11, 2026. How we score β†’

Where the score comes from

We look at six areas. Here's how usatoday.com did in each.
85
Security

The site uses a valid SSL certificate and enforces HTTPS with strong browser protections. This is exactly what you'd expect from a major news outlet handling no payments or logins.

80
Identity

The domain is over three decades old and registered under GoDaddy Corporate Domains, which is typical for large media groups like Gannett. While the specific owner isn't public, the age and brand recognition speak for themselves.

90
Reputation

This is one of the 600 most-visited sites globally, has never been blacklisted, and shows no signs of malicious activity. Its long web history and clean security reports back up its standing.

70
Transparency

Our scan didn't catch an about page or obvious contact info on the homepage β€” that's unusual for a news brand but not alarming given the site's fame. The security.txt file points to Gannett's disclosure program, which is a good sign.

70
Compliance

No privacy policy or terms of service were detected during this scan. For a US-based news site, that's a minor gap, though most legitimate outlets do publish them. The absence may be a scanning artifact rather than a real omission.

80
Infrastructure

Fast page loads, a content delivery network, and solid email authentication show the site is professionally hosted. DNSSEC isn't enabled, but that's common and not a practical risk for a news site.

What we checked

The 34 signals behind this report.
Security & Transport
Certificate Issuer
Let's Encrypt
Content Security Policy
Present
Google Web Risk
Clean
HSTS Header
Present
SSL Certificate
Valid
Security Headers
3 of 6
TLS Version
TLS 1.3
security.txt
Present
Identity & WHOIS
About Page
Not found
Branding
Basic
Business Disclosure
Not found
Contact Info
Not found
Domain Age
32 years, 10 months
Domain Expiry
2027-04-30T04:00:00Z
Legal Pages
Missing
Registrar
GoDaddy Corporate Domains, LLC
Infrastructure & DNS
CDN
Cloud.ru / Selectel / generic
DMARC Record
p=none (monitoring only)
DNS Blacklists
Clean
DNS Resolution
1 IP(s)
DNSSEC
Not enabled
DNSSEC
unsigned
Email (MX Records)
1 record(s)
Hosting Network (ASN)
AS54113 FASTLY
Name Servers
8 server(s)
Page Load Time
623ms
Reputation & Reach
Sitemap
Misconfigured
Social Media Presence
None found
Structured Data
None found
Tranco Rank
Rank #532
Trustpilot
No Trustpilot profile
Web Archive History
Unable to check
Website Status
Online
robots.txt
Present

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72
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USA Today (usatoday.com) is one of the most recognizable news brands in the US, and the data backs that up. The domain has been active since 1994, sits among the top 600 websites globally, and shows no history of malware or blacklisting. That kind of track record is hard to fake. For a news site, the security setup is solid: HTTPS is enforced, browser protections are in place, and the site loads fast from a professional content delivery network. We didn't find an about page or privacy policy during our automated scan, but given the site's well-known parent company (Gannett) and its decades of public operation, those omissions are almost certainly a scanning glitch rather than a real concern. If you're wondering 'is usatoday.com safe to read?', the answer is yes β€” it's a legitimate news outlet with no red flags. You won't find usatoday.com reviews calling it a scam because it isn't one. The only thing to watch for is the same as any news site: check the bylines and dates, and be aware that editorial content isn't the same as fact. But the site itself is trustworthy.

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