Questions
The things people ask before they start
Answered at the length the question deserves, including the ones where the answer is no.
The basics
What this is, who it suits, what Free actually includes, and how long a first version takes.
What is a trust centre, in one paragraph?
A page you own that answers the security and data-protection questions buyers ask, before they ask them. Your certifications, what is covered and what is not, who your subprocessors are, and the documents themselves. Anything sensitive sits behind an agreement a buyer accepts on the page, so you can publish openly without publishing everything.
Why it exists: most suppliers answer the same forty questions for every prospect, by hand, from an out-of-date spreadsheet. The work is real; doing it once a quarter instead of once a customer is the saving.
Who is this for?
Suppliers who sell to organisations that run due diligence: software companies, agencies, processors, anyone whose deals stall on a security questionnaire. It suits a company small enough that the questionnaire lands on somebody who has another job as well.
Why that shape: a large enterprise has a team and a portal already. The people this helps most are the ones for whom a questionnaire is an interruption rather than a role.
Is Free actually free, or a trial?
Free. One real trust page on a vitrovault.com address, the confidentiality agreement, an uncapped number of buyers accepting it, access requests, your subprocessor list, colleagues with roles, two-factor, and the complete audit trail. No card, no expiry.
Why we do that: a trust page nobody can afford does not get made, and a product whose cheapest tier is the least trustworthy is the wrong product to be selling. What you pay for is currency and checking, not the ability to be honest.
How long does it take to put up?
An afternoon for a first version, if your documents exist. Upload what you have, write the short overview, choose what is public and what is gated, publish. It is meant to be started before it is finished.
Why we say it that way: the failure mode is a page that never goes live because someone is waiting to have everything. A page with three documents and an honest gap is more use to a buyer than nothing.
Documents, agreements and access
The confidentiality agreement, what a buyer does to open a gated document, and what happens to people who signed an earlier version or signed on paper.
Do I have to write my own NDA?
No. Every page comes with a standard confidentiality agreement, so your gate works from the first minute. Plus lets you replace the wording with your own; Managed can hold five different agreements, so different material can carry different terms. How often buyers accept one is never limited, on any plan.
Why it works that way: the flow used to depend on the supplier writing legal text first, on the tier least likely to have anyone to write it. A gate pointing at nothing is not a gate.
What does a buyer actually do to read a gated document?
They give a work email, prove it with a one-time code, read the agreement and accept it. Then the document opens. You either let that happen automatically and hear about it, or hold every one for your approval; that is a per-page setting.
Why the code: without it, anyone can type anyone's address, and your record of who accepted is worth nothing. It is the difference between a log and evidence.
If I publish a new version of my agreement, what happens to people who signed the old one?
Their access continues, and the version they accepted stays on the record as what was true that day. The next time they come back they are asked to accept the current text. Nobody is emailed about it and nothing is revoked.
Why not just ask everyone: the agreement is between you and them. Emailing a stranger about a change to somebody else's contract, using an address they gave to read one document, is not ours to do.
Someone signed on paper. Can I let them in?
Yes, and you say so explicitly when you grant it, so the trail records that the agreement was made off the page rather than pretending they clicked something.
Why the distinction matters: those grants are not subject to your page's version changes, because they never agreed to your page's text. Treating both the same would silently cut off everyone who signed with your legal team.
Can a buyer's AI agent read my page?
Whatever you publish openly, yes, on every plan, and by design: it is published. For gated material, Managed can issue a key that a buyer's agent uses, after you approve it. The key expires, you can revoke it, and every use lands on your trail.
Why gated access is Managed only: a standing key that reads evidence with no person present needs an approval queue, an expiry sweep and a revocation path behind it. Offering the key without those would be offering the risk without the controls.
Data, exit and the awkward questions
Where your data sits, what we keep about your buyers, how to leave, and the questions a vendor is supposed to find uncomfortable.
Where is our data, and who is the controller?
Ireland, in the EU, throughout. For your trust page you are the controller and we are your processor, under a written agreement, with a published retention schedule.
Why the answer is short: a residency promise with an exception in it is not a residency promise. There is no other region in the path.
What do you keep about the buyers who visit my page?
What your gate asked for: name, work email, company, the version they accepted, and when. Plus the record of what they opened, which is the evidence the page exists to produce. It is your data, held for you, and it goes when your account goes.
Why we are careful here: they are a third party who came to read something about you. Keeping more than the gate needed would be collecting on your behalf without anybody having asked us to.
How do I leave?
Close the account yourself from the console. Before anything happens you are shown exactly what will be erased, which addresses stop resolving, how many buyers lose access, and what we keep and why. Confirm, and it is done.
Why the preview: closing is the one irreversible act in the product. The consequence is calculated from the same state the act reads, so what you were told cannot drift from what happens.
Does any of this make us compliant with anything?
No, and we will not say otherwise. It gives you the evidence to show work you have already done, in a form a buyer can check. Certification comes from a certification body, not from a page.
Why we are blunt about it: this product is sold on being trustworthy. A convenient overstatement here would undo more than it sells, and the buyers reading your page are exactly the people trained to spot one.
What is the difference between declared, assessed, validated and audited?
Four levels of who checked. Declared is your word. Assessed means each area names the document behind it, on the page, so a buyer can follow the claim to the paper. Validated means we asked for proof that what the documents describe actually happens. Audited is a full internal audit under its own agreement. The first two are plans; the last two are scheduled work. The pricing page sets them out.
Why we separate them: "assessed" and "audited" sound similar and mean very different things. A buyer reading one and hearing the other is a misunderstanding we would have caused.
What happens if VitroVault goes away?
Your documents are yours and can be taken out at any time; a buyer's evidence record is a standalone file that stays readable without us. Your page is on your own domain from Plus upward, so the address is yours to point elsewhere.
Why we answer it at all: it is a fair question about any small supplier, and one your own buyers will ask you. A vendor who is offended by it is telling you something.
Still asking?
Email hello@vitrovault.com. If the question is about a specific page hosted with us, include its address.