{"slug":"usatoday-4nkstc","companyName":"USA Today","domain":"usatoday.com","url":"https://usatoday.com","headline":"1 human and 3 agent dimensions measured from the pages checked; remaining dimensions are not scored.","compositeScore":65,"humanScore":90,"agentScore":39,"doorGap":51,"humanMeasured":1,"agentMeasured":3,"percentile":null,"humanPercentile":null,"agentPercentile":null,"isPartial":false,"depth":"free","siteClass":"content","scannerVersion":48,"scannerRelease":"827acc8","scoringMethodologyVersion":1,"evidenceSchemaVersion":1,"benchmarkEdition":"methodology-1","scannedAt":"2026-09-10T18:59:25.300Z","unlocked":false,"mission":{"steps":[{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com","outcome":"ok","purpose":"reach the site at all"},{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com/robots.txt","outcome":"missing","purpose":"find out whether machines are welcome"},{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com","outcome":"ok","purpose":"ask whether the door opens for requests carrying the AI crawlers' names"},{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com/llms.txt","outcome":"missing","purpose":"read the site's own guide for language models"},{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com/news-sitemap.xml","outcome":"ok","purpose":"find out what pages exist"},{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com/.well-known/security.txt","outcome":"ok","purpose":"find a contact route for machines"},{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com","outcome":"missing","purpose":"find an MCP manifest at the standard paths checked"},{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com/.well-known/ai-plugin.json","outcome":"missing","purpose":"find an agent plugin manifest"},{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com","outcome":"missing","purpose":"find out whether verified agents are recognised"},{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com","outcome":"ok","purpose":"read the homepage as data rather than as a page"},{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com","outcome":"missing","purpose":"find a machine readable API spec"},{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com","outcome":"missing","purpose":"read the developer documentation"},{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com/","outcome":"ok","purpose":"walk the way a visitor would, to a signup form or a product"}],"verdict":"The scanner recorded successful observations for 6 of 13 checks, but could not find out whether machines are welcome. It came up empty on 6 other checks too."},"observations":[{"url":"https://www.usatoday.com/","step":1,"detail":"The homepage links directly to 31 articles or stories checked by this scan. No subscription, sign-in or payment was attempted.","moment":"Entry observation","verdict":"observed"}],"dimensions":[{"key":"machine_discoverability","audience":"agent","score":32,"summary":"Robots.txt blocks 6 of the crawlers that fetch pages to answer a buyer. Robots.txt blocks 7 training crawlers, a choice about model weights rather than about buyers. On its first visit, our browser read the homepage.","measurement":{"status":"observed"},"evidence":{"locked":true,"count":6}},{"key":"programmatic_onboarding","audience":"agent","score":null,"summary":"Not applicable to this scanned surface.","measurement":{"reason":"not_applicable","status":"not_applicable"},"evidence":{"locked":true,"count":0}},{"key":"pricing_legibility","audience":"agent","score":null,"summary":"Not applicable to this scanned surface.","measurement":{"reason":"not_applicable","status":"not_applicable"},"evidence":{"locked":true,"count":0}},{"key":"agent_aware_instrumentation","audience":"agent","score":0,"summary":"No MCP manifest was identified at the discovery paths checked. 6 retrieval or agent crawler names are disallowed in robots.txt.","measurement":{"status":"observed"},"evidence":{"locked":true,"count":4}},{"key":"machine_fetchable_trust","audience":"agent","score":85,"summary":"Security.txt is published with a contact route. The homepage answers automated requests.","measurement":{"status":"observed"},"evidence":{"locked":true,"count":2}},{"key":"commercial_rails","audience":"agent","score":null,"summary":"Not applicable to this scanned surface.","measurement":{"reason":"not_applicable","status":"not_applicable"},"evidence":{"locked":true,"count":0}},{"key":"steps_to_first_value","audience":"human","score":90,"summary":"The article or story catalogue was reached in 1 step from the homepage; subscription, sign-in and payment were not tested.","measurement":{"status":"observed"},"evidence":{"locked":true,"count":1}},{"key":"required_fields","audience":"human","score":null,"summary":"Not applicable to this scanned surface.","measurement":{"reason":"not_applicable","status":"not_applicable"},"evidence":{"locked":true,"count":0}},{"key":"verification_walls","audience":"human","score":null,"summary":"Not applicable to this scanned surface.","measurement":{"reason":"not_applicable","status":"not_applicable"},"evidence":{"locked":true,"count":0}},{"key":"error_recovery","audience":"human","score":null,"summary":"Not applicable to this scanned surface.","measurement":{"reason":"not_applicable","status":"not_applicable"},"evidence":{"locked":true,"count":0}}],"issues":[{"rank":1,"title":"No valid llms.txt was identified at the site root.","dimensionKey":"machine_discoverability","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":2},"fix":null}],"fixArtifacts":{"locked":true,"count":2,"summaries":[{"id":"robots_search_bots:robots-txt","kind":"robots_search_bots","title":"robots.txt rules for AI crawlers","path":"/robots.txt","effort":{"minutes":10,"role":"owner"},"outcome":{"dimension":"machine_discoverability","external":["The named policy tokens are permitted by the proposed rules; successful fetching and citation remain separate checks."]}},{"id":"llms_txt:llms-txt","kind":"llms_txt","title":"llms.txt","path":"/llms.txt","effort":{"minutes":15,"role":"owner"},"outcome":{"dimension":"machine_discoverability","external":["Assistants that read llms.txt get a curated map of the site instead of guessing from the homepage."]}}]},"feedback":{"endpoint":"/api/feedback","mcpTool":"rate_fix","targets":[{"type":"report","key":"report"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"machine_discoverability","key":"dimension:machine_discoverability"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"programmatic_onboarding","key":"dimension:programmatic_onboarding"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"pricing_legibility","key":"dimension:pricing_legibility"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"agent_aware_instrumentation","key":"dimension:agent_aware_instrumentation"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"machine_fetchable_trust","key":"dimension:machine_fetchable_trust"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"commercial_rails","key":"dimension:commercial_rails"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"steps_to_first_value","key":"dimension:steps_to_first_value"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"required_fields","key":"dimension:required_fields"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"verification_walls","key":"dimension:verification_walls"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"error_recovery","key":"dimension:error_recovery"},{"type":"issue","dimensionKey":"machine_discoverability","checkId":"llms_txt","key":"issue:machine_discoverability:llms_txt"}]}}