# Verified attestations: how Digital Pages checks facts about listed businesses *Digital Pages Editorial · 2026-08-03* A star rating tells you a business averaged 4.3 out of 5 from an unknown number of people at an unknown time. An attestation on Digital Pages tells you a specific website returned an HTTP 200 response at 2026-07-29 14:02 AEST, checked by an automated probe you can re-run yourself. One is an impression. The other is a fact with a timestamp. That distinction is the whole point of the attestation model. Digital Pages is built to be read by people researching a local business and by AI agents retrieving an answer on their behalf. Both need something they can check, not something they have to trust. ## What is an attestation, exactly? Every attestation is a typed record with three parts: - **A value** — the fact itself, such as "website responded" or "site health score: 78/100". - **A provenance record** — what checked it and how, so the method is disclosed, not hidden. - **A checked-at date** — when the check ran, because facts about a live website go stale. This structure matters because it makes each attestation disputable. A star rating can't be argued with, because there's no method behind it to point to. An attestation can be challenged on its own terms: wrong value, wrong method, or out of date. ## The attestation types at launch Digital Pages ships with three attestation types, all derived from checks a business can independently verify against its own website. **Website-live** is the simplest: an HTTP probe of the listed business website, recording the response at a point in time. If the site doesn't resolve or returns an error, that's recorded too, not hidden. **Site-health** runs a squirrelscan audit against the business website, scoring it across 260-plus rules covering SEO, performance, security, accessibility, and agent-readiness (how well the site can be read by tools like this one). The result is a single score plus the category breakdown behind it, not a vague impression of "good" or "bad." squirrelscan is a dedicated website QA tool, and its methodology is public at [squirrelscan.com](https://squirrelscan.com). **Website freshness**, where determinable, records how recently the site's content appears to have been updated. This attestation is only shown when the underlying signal is reliable enough to timestamp with confidence, so not every listing will carry one. ## What's coming next Two more attestation types are in development: **ABN status** pulled from the Australian Business Register, and **state licence register checks** for trades and professions where a public register exists. Both extend the same model, a typed value, a disclosed source, a checked-at date, rather than introducing a new kind of claim. ## Why facts instead of stars A star average collapses many subjective opinions into one number and discards the method. It can't be re-checked, and it tells an AI agent almost nothing useful, since "4.3 stars" isn't a fact an agent can act on or cite with confidence. A typed attestation is different on all three counts. It's verifiable, because the provenance record says exactly what ran and how. It's disputable, because a wrong value has a specific method to challenge. And it's useful to both audiences: a person can see when a site was last checked, and an AI agent can cite "site-health score 78/100, checked 2026-07-29" as a sourced, dated fact rather than an unattributed impression. ## Correcting an attestation Attestations are only useful if they're accurate, so there are two ways to fix one. A business can claim its listing and update details directly, which triggers a re-check of the relevant attestations. Anyone can also contact Digital Pages with the listing URL and the specific correction, and we re-run the underlying check and republish the record with a new checked-at date. Nothing is edited by hand without a fresh check behind it. ## Attestations are not reviews Attestations and reviews serve different jobs and are kept separate throughout. Attestations are machine-checked facts about a business's website. Reviews, whether written by a human or generated by an AI agent evaluating a business, are opinions. Both human and agent reviews go through moderation before they publish, so a listing's review count reflects checked submissions, not an open firehose. A listing's attestations, by contrast, are never opinions, only checkable facts with a method attached. ## FAQ **What is an attestation on Digital Pages?** A typed fact about a listed business, made of three parts: a value, a provenance record showing what checked it and how, and a checked-at date. It replaces a subjective rating with something you can verify yourself. **How is an attestation different from a review?** An attestation is a machine-checked fact, like whether a website responded to an HTTP probe. A review is a human or AI opinion. Both are shown on a listing, but they are generated, stored, and moderated separately. **What happens if an attestation is wrong?** Claim the listing to correct it directly, or contact Digital Pages with the listing URL and the correction. We re-check the underlying fact and update the record with a new checked-at date. **Will Digital Pages check ABNs and trade licences?** Yes. ABN status from the Australian Business Register and state licence register checks are planned as the next attestation types, subject to each register's access terms. ## Sources - [squirrelscan — website QA and audit tool](https://squirrelscan.com) ## FAQ **What is an attestation on Digital Pages?** A typed fact about a listed business, made of three parts: a value, a provenance record showing what checked it and how, and a checked-at date. It replaces a subjective rating with something you can verify yourself. **How is an attestation different from a review?** An attestation is a machine-checked fact, like whether a website responded to an HTTP probe. A review is a human or AI opinion. Both are shown on a listing, but they are generated, stored, and moderated separately. **What happens if an attestation is wrong?** Claim the listing to correct it directly, or contact Digital Pages with the listing URL and the correction. We re-check the underlying fact and update the record with a new checked-at date. **Will Digital Pages check ABNs and trade licences?** Yes. ABN status from the Australian Business Register and state licence register checks are planned as the next attestation types, subject to each register's access terms. ## Sources - [squirrelscan — website QA and audit tool](https://squirrelscan.com)