64% of Third-Party Apps Access Sensitive Data Without Justification, New Research Reveals

A new 2026 research report analyzing 4,700 leading websites reveals that 64% of third-party applications now access sensitive data without business justification, representing a sharp acceleration from 51% in 2024. This 25% year-over-year increase signals a critical escalation in web exposure risks, particularly affecting government and education sectors where malicious activity has spiked dramatically.

The Governance Gap Driving Unjustified Access

The research, conducted over 12 months ending November 2025 by Reflectiz, identifies "unjustified access" as a systemic governance failure. This occurs when third-party tools—analytics platforms, marketing pixels, CDNs, and payment integrations—receive permissions to access sensitive data fields they don't functionally require.

The study flags access as unjustified when third-party scripts meet specific criteria:

• Irrelevant Function: Tools reading data unnecessary for their task (e.g., a chatbot accessing payment fields)
• Zero-ROI Presence: Scripts remaining active on high-risk pages after 90+ days of zero data transmission
• Shadow Deployment: Injection via Tag Managers without security oversight or "least privilege" scoping
• Over-Permissioning: Utilizing "Full DOM Access" to scrape entire pages rather than restricted elements

This governance gap is most pronounced in Entertainment and Online Retail, where marketing pressures routinely override security reviews. The research identifies specific tools driving this exposure:

• Google Tag Manager: Accounts for 8% of all unjustified sensitive data access
• Shopify: Represents 5% of unjustified access instances
• Facebook Pixel: In 4% of analyzed deployments, found over-permissioned and capturing sensitive input fields beyond functional tracking needs

Critical Infrastructure Under Siege

The sector breakdown reveals a troubling pattern tied to budget constraints rather than technical sophistication:

• Government Sector: Malicious activity exploded from 2% to 12.9%
• Education Sector: Compromised sites quadrupled to 14.3% (affecting 1 in 7 sites)
• Insurance Sector: Reduced malicious activity by 60% to just 1.3%, demonstrating the value of dedicated security budgets

Survey data from 120+ security leaders across healthcare, finance, and retail confirms the resource gap: 34% cite budget constraints as their primary obstacle, while 31% point to insufficient manpower. This combination disproportionately impacts public institutions, which are losing the supply chain battle against better-funded private sectors.

The Awareness-Action Disconnect

Perhaps most concerning is the 42-percentage-point gap between recognition and remediation:

• 81% of security leaders call web attacks a top priority
• Only 39% have deployed dedicated solutions to address third-party risks
• 61% remain in evaluation phases or rely on inadequate general security tools

This disconnect explains why unjustified access continues growing despite widespread awareness. The survey found that 24% of organizations rely solely on general security tools like WAFs, which cannot detect the specific third-party script behaviors this research identified. Another 34% are still evaluating dedicated solutions, leaving 58% of organizations properly undefended.

The Marketing Department Factor

Marketing and digital teams now drive 43% of all third-party risk exposure, compared to just 19% created by IT departments. This "Marketing Footprint" represents a structural organizational problem where deployment authority and security responsibility are misaligned.

The research found that 47% of apps running in payment frames lack business justification. Marketing teams frequently deploy conversion tools into these sensitive environments without understanding the security implications. Yet security practitioners recognize the threat: 20% of survey respondents ranked supply chain attacks and third-party script vulnerabilities among their top three concerns.

The Facebook Pixel Systemic Risk

With 53.2% ubiquity across analyzed sites, Facebook Pixel represents a massive systemic single point of failure. The risk isn't inherent to the tool itself, but rather unmanaged permissions. Features like "Full DOM Access" and "Automatic Advanced Matching" can transform marketing pixels into unintentional data scrapers.

The research draws a sobering comparison: a compromise of Facebook Pixel would be 5x larger than the 2024 Polyfill.io attack, which affected 100,000 sites. Facebook Pixel's 53.2% ubiquity means over 2.5 million sites could be compromised instantly.

The recommended fix is Context-Aware Deployment: restricting pixels to landing pages where they provide ROI, while strictly blocking them from payment and credential frames where they lack business justification.

Technical Indicators of Compromise

For the first time, the research pinpoints technical signals that predict compromised sites. Compromised configurations show measurable differences:

• Recently Registered Domains: Appear 3.8x more often on compromised sites (within last 6 months)
• External Connections: Compromised sites connect to 2.7x more external domains (100 vs. 36 average)
• Mixed Content: 63% of compromised sites mix HTTPS/HTTP protocols

These indicators provide security teams with actionable detection criteria beyond traditional signature-based approaches.

Security Benchmarks: Leaders vs. Average

Among 4,700 analyzed sites, 429 demonstrated strong security outcomes, proving functionality and security can coexist:

Top Performers:

• ticketweb.uk: Only site meeting all 8 benchmarks (Grade A+)
• GitHub, PayPal, Yale University: Meeting 7 benchmarks (Grade A)

Key Differentiators:

• Leaders maintain ≤8 third-party apps vs. 15-25 in average organizations
• Leaders demonstrate governance, not just resources

Three Quick Wins for Security Teams

1. Audit Trackers Immediately

Inventory every pixel and tracker, identifying owner and business justification. Remove tools that cannot justify data access.

Priority fixes:

• Facebook Pixel: Disable 'Automatic Advanced Matching' on pages with personally identifiable information
• Google Tag Manager: Verify no payment page access
• Shopify: Review app permissions for over-privileging

2. Implement Automated Monitoring

Deploy runtime monitoring for:

• Sensitive field access detection (credit cards, SSNs, credentials)
• Real-time alerts for unauthorized collection
• Content Security Policy violation tracking

3. Address the Marketing-IT Divide

Establish joint CISO + CMO review processes:

• Review marketing tools deployed in payment frames
• Implement Facebook Pixel scoping using Allow/Exclusion Lists
• Balance tracker ROI against security risk

The Path Forward

The research demonstrates that organizations granting sensitive data access by default rather than exception are creating expanding vulnerabilities. The 25% year-over-year increase in unjustified access reflects not technical failure, but governance failure.

Security teams must recognize that third-party applications represent a supply chain risk requiring dedicated management. General security tools cannot detect the specific behaviors that create these exposures. The organizations achieving Grade A security outcomes prove that proper governance, not unlimited budget, determines success.

For security leaders, the message is clear: awareness without action creates vulnerability at scale. The 42-percentage-point gap between recognizing web attacks as a priority and deploying solutions to stop them explains precisely why unjustified access continues accelerating.

The complete 43-page analysis includes sector-by-sector risk breakdowns, complete lists of high-risk third-party applications, year-over-year trend analysis, and detailed security leader best practices.

Download the Complete 43-Page Analysis