Method
The collector requested the HTTP apex and HTTPS www variants with automatic redirect following disabled. It recorded the first status and Location header. DNS errors are retained as errors rather than silently discarded.
Only two intentional variants were checked. This is a normalization baseline, not a broad subdomain scan.
Observed evidence
HTTP 302 → https://sitesignalhub.com/The insecure apex converged on the preferred HTTPS URL.Status 0 · gaierrorThe www hostname did not resolve from the measurement environment.https://sitesignalhub.comUsed consistently in the raw dataset and sitemap.Findings
- HTTP-to-HTTPS normalization worked with a 302 at measurement time.
- The www variant had no resolvable DNS path.
- A user or backlink using www would fail before a canonical signal could be read.
Decision and resulting changes
Add an explicit www DNS and redirect rule, then verify it with the same no-follow measurement. Prefer a permanent redirect only after the destination is proven stable.
- Recorded the failure as a public baseline.
- Separated hostname remediation from page canonical remediation.
- Added the www variant to ongoing monitoring.
Limits and reproduction
Re-run automation/evidence_collector.py against the public origin and compare the resulting JSON fields. A difference is evidence of a changed response, not automatically an improvement.
- DNS answers can vary by resolver and time.
- The study does not enumerate unrelated subdomains.
Primary references
— Baseline captured from the public site, limitations documented, and remediation decision published.
Prepared by SiteSignal Hub Field Lab. Evidence collection and structural checks are automated; no personal use, customer result, or human test is claimed.