It is crucial to review all relevant information when it comes to high-risk transactions. It is often a matter of sifting through hundreds of thousands of highly sensitive documents. It’s not only a time-consuming process for those involved, but it also poses serious security risks for the company itself. Fortunately, there is an easier method to manage this kind of document review. Data rooms are physical or virtual space in which companies can store and share sensitive information with authorized individuals. Data rooms are often used in mergers and acquisitions tenders, capital raising and other business transactions.
While free or low-cost tools such as Dropbox, Google Drive and SharePoint can be useful for daily file-sharing, they do not provide the security and protection needed to facilitate due diligence and protect high-value documents. This could lead to the errors in handling important documents, and pose a risk of compliancy that could ruin the entire transaction.
There are data room online providers that provide a secure, safe space for sharing sensitive information. These services are generally easier to use than physical data rooms and come with several of other features that help streamline the data-sharing process.
A data room, for example could have a drag-and drop upload interface which allows users to upload large files in a single click. Advanced search capabilities enable documents to be retrieved quickly, even if they have been uploaded in large quantities. Other important features could include a customizable watermark that appears digitally over files whenever they’re seen, downloaded, or printed, as well as privacy settings that allow administrators to establish custom NDAs for every user.