We are a start-up company. Our clients will upload confidential financial data on our site. What kind of a experts do I need to talk to?

Thanks for your inquiry. We should probably have a quick chat. I have a few questions to better understand your situation, like these (probably others too): Where are you located? Where is the company registered, domiciled? What are your intended financing activities? Where? Have you done a round already? Any other financing activities to date? Cheers, rm

You want to make sure that the connection to the site is safe, the database is secured and the site is accessible only to people with privileges. Btw. It doesn't matter where the clients are. Anything but an in-house connection requires the same security measure, no matter the distance. There are several ways to do this: If you can setup a virtual private network with all your clients, that's the safest. If that's not feasible because your clients are more short-term clients or individuals (rather than long-term company contact) then it's more complicated. A lot also depends on the number of clients you are wanting to handle. You should definitely talk to a security and privacy expert and then you probably need to hire a system administrator that is able to maintain your site with updates and keep it secure. You probably also want to talk to a lawyer to keep you safe from lawsuits by defining the terms of services of your website in the right way and to also estimate the potential damages that could happen if things go wrong, so you can prioritize. I can offer advise on the technical side of things so you can take it from there once I know your situation a bit better.

What type of financial data are you going to be holding on your site?
- I ask this because here in the UK, to hold certain financial data (either individuals or businesses) you have to be first cleared by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). This is usually a long time-consuming application. This is why the two professionals you should go see straight away is a lawyer (preferably a financial lawyer) and a cyber security specialist.

1. Financial Lawyer - A lawyer is the first person you will want to talk to. Explain your whole business and how everything would work. That way, the lawyer can give you the best possible advice to help your business. You might have to put things on hold until you become licensed and a lawyer can help you with the whole process.

2. Cyber security specialist - Since you are holding important private information, you will need to make sure that information is as secured as it can be. It is likely that you might be targeted because of the information you hold. A cyber security specialist could help you protect it.

I hope this helps you! Feel free to schedule a call with me or visit our website (linkilaw.com) for a free startup legal consultation.