When a business sets up the virtual data room, they must plan out who and how many users are allowed access to the files within it. It is important to establish the rights of each user and to set their access levels according to their job role. An investor at stage one might not require access to the repository in full but may only be able view the financial statements and business plans. This is in accordance with the principle of least privilege, and helps protect sensitive information from being accessed by unauthorised individuals. It is also recommended to examine the user’s access regularly and to revoke it whenever their role and responsibilities have changed.
The process of setting up a VDR usually involves the uploading of all necessary files into a structured folder structure that has distinct titles and descriptions. This organization helps parties quickly and effortlessly locate the data they need. It is also important to follow a consistent naming convention and tag files with metadata before uploading them. This will allow them to be identified and searched in the data room.
A data room should contain a section for Q&A, which lets users ask questions and get answers. This will speed up the due diligence process, and provide quicker and more precise responses. It is also a good idea to include dynamic watermarks on all downloaded and printed documents as a security measure. To ensure security, a dataroom must also provide multi-factor authentication, and also a set of session timeouts.