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As of April 16, all the funds for that Paycheck Protection Program happen to be claimed and also the SBA has announced that it is not currently accepting new applications for Economic Injury Disaster Loans. We will continue to monitor the problem and can let smaller businesses know if there are further changes either to program.
Bank of the usa is among the largest and most omnipresent lenders in the united states, so it’s no surprise that lots of smaller businesses seeking relief with the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) during the COVID-19 crisis are utilising through the bank. Applicants looking to just cope with Bank of America infrastructure are, however, encountering unfamiliar software supplied by certainly one of its partners, IntraLinks.
Note, at this time the PPP is currently suspended as a result of lack of appropriations. It’s not clear whether Congress will approve additional rounds of funding for the program.
What Is IntraLinks?
IntraLinks is really a publically traded tech company resides in Nyc. Founded in 1996 by John Muldoon and Mark Adams and then acquired by TA Associates, the organization specializes in creating software for the financial industry, in addition to Virtual Data Rooms (VDR). VDR are online databases companies can use to store and share confidential information, typically throughout a financial transaction. IntraLinks customers include Goldman Sachs, Starbucks, General Mills, Whole Foods, and L’Oreal.
In the context of Bank of America’s PPP applications, they are repurposing those VDR tools to allow people to remotely submit their documents and pertinent information. Bank of the usa claims this can expedite the application process and permit the bank to faster submit the information towards the Small Business Administration (SBA) for approval.
Is IntraLinks Safe?
If it isn’t, they aren’t doing their job perfectly. There’s always some justifiable skepticism when a 3rd party is brought into a transaction that involves sensitive information. That said, IntraLinks’s bread and butter is providing secure infrastructure for the exchange of sensitive information. Bank of America’s use of that technology falls within that umbrella.
IntraLinks is certified under the EU-US Privacy Shield. Participating organizations are considered to provide “adequate” protection for the change in data outside the Eu under the EU Data Protection Directive. U.S. organizations which are susceptible to the jurisdiction from the Ftc could also participate. The guidelines of the EU Data Protection Directive are listed below:
- Notice—data subjects ought to be given notice when their data is being collected;
- Purpose—data should only be utilized with the objective stated and never for any other purposes;
- Consent—data should not be disclosed with no data subject’s consent;
- Security—collected data ought to be kept secure from the potential abuses;
- Disclosure—data subjects should be informed as to who's collecting their data;
- Access—data subjects ought to be allowed to access their data and make corrections to any inaccurate data
- Accountability—data subjects must have a technique at hand to hold data collectors responsible for not following the above principles
Additional security certifications include:
- ISO/IEC 27001:2022
- SOC 1; SOC 2; SOC 3 (formerly SSAE 16 / ISAE 3402)
- SOC 2 Type II (formerly SAS 70 Type II)
- ISO/IEC 20000-1
- ISO 9001
- ISO 27017 & ISO 27001
IntraLinks also touts its trademarked “Distribute Content Nodes.” It’s an expensive way of saying IntraLink lets customers–in this instance Bank of America–determine what geographic regions the information will ultimately be kept in, and from where processing functions like encryption and indexing is going to be run. So, for instance, if your company doesn’t want information stored outside the United States, they might ask IntraLinks to keep it inside the borders. Additionally, IntraLinks offers customer management encryption keys that control use of sensitive documents.
User reviews of IntraLinks VDRs are mixed. In most cases, users are pleased with the features and security the program offers. Most of the negative comments are usually about the price of the service and it is learning curve. The company is not accredited using the BBB, although the watchdog group does rate it an A- because of failure to reply to one registered customer complaint. That specific customer were not impressed with the company “refusing to cease email communications to an employee who's no longer with this company.”
So could it be safe?
Nothing is 100% secure, but if you’re comfortable giving a bank like Bank of America your data online to begin with, you shouldn’t be too worried about IntraLinks.
Tips For implementing IntraLinks Platform
While safety shouldn’t be considered a major concern, usability might be another matter. IntraLinks is generally created for corporate acquisitions and proprietary information-sharing. In other words, it might normally be overkill for a financial loan application. It’s complicated enough that Bank of America provided a downloadable walkthrough for how to use it to complete your PPP application.
The best advice I can give, apart from “do as instructed in the guide” would be to ignore most of the program. Exactly what you need to do to complete the application will be performed underneath the DOCUMENTS heading. Be sure to keep that tab highlighted whenever you’re interacting with IntraLinks.
Initially, you’ll pull all of the instructions you'll need out of the Instructions folder and download them via a ZIP file. After you’ve gathered those you need, you’ll drag them into white space beneath the Instructions folder. Every time you give a file, you’ll be confronted by a pop-up window to confirm your upload. All you need to do is click upload.
On the bright side, if something goes wrong, you will probably be contacted by Bank of America.
Final Thoughts On IntraLinks
Unusual events like the COVID-19 crisis test the infrastructure of many institutions in addition to subject their customers to unfamiliar processes. For many PPP applicants, this is the very first time they’ve encountered a course like IntraLinks. Having said that, there’s pointless to fear this particular one.
Need more help navigating the coronavirus crisis? Check out our COVID-19 small business resources.
