Introduction
Some users need to work with Financial, Operational, or Compliance reporting data without seeing the identity of the stakeholders behind each row. For example, a finance team member may need to review IFRS 2 reporting data, or an auditor may need access to compliance outputs, without being allowed to see investor or employee names.
Ledgy anonymises stakeholder identity for these restricted users consistently across reporting. Where anonymisation applies, stakeholder identity is masked in report pages, grids, previews, CSV/Excel exports, locked reports, and related reporting views. Instead of real stakeholder details, restricted users see anonymised placeholders such as “Anonymous stakeholder”.
Who counts as a "restricted user"?
The same anonymisation logic Ledgy already uses in the product, is now applied across reporting. A collaborator is treated as "restricted user" when they should not see the identity of all stakeholders in their company. This can happen in either of these cases:
Their Custom role type has given access to a subset of stakeholders, rather than all stakeholders. For example, a role may only have access to stakeholders in the “Investors” group. See Manage access with default and custom collaborator roles for more information.
The company has configured one or more Anonymous stakeholders in Company Settings > General > Equity Management Settings and the collaborator is not an Owner or Admin. See Manage access with default and custom collaborator roles.
What restricted users see
Any stakeholder outside the user's accessible scope, or included in the company's Anonymous stakeholders list, appears as "Anonymous stakeholder" instead of their real name.
Other identifying details or Standard PII are masked by default (address, custom field values, etc.) and shown as blank fields
Custom and optional fields may contain personal data and can be selected for anonymisation by an admin, these fields may be anonymised.
If the restricted user is themselves a stakeholder in the company, their own record is always shown with full detail.
Restricted users can still filter, sort, group, and navigate the report as usual; only the identity fields are masked, so totals, percentages, and other figures are unaffected.
Where this applies
Anonymisation for restricted users is now consistent across:
Financial Reporting - IFRS 2 / FRS 102 / ASC 718 expensing and disclosure reports, Locked Reports (including report previews and Locked Report History), Custom accounting, Performance expectations, Tranche overrides and Cost Centre movements.
Operational Reporting - All reports
Compliance Reporting - including FATCA/CRS reports.
Good to know:
This works in tandem with the new reporting access controls (Financial, Operational and Compliance). Anonymisation is applied consistently across reporting, the access controls manage what a user can edit.
Exports match exactly what the user sees on screen, so a restricted user can never recover a real name by exporting a report instead of viewing it in-app.
What full-access users see
This change does not affect users who already have full visibility of all Stakeholders. A collaborator continues to see real stakeholder names and details in reporting depending on their current role type:
For Owners and Admins, they will always see all Stakeholders
For a Custom role type, that has specified access to All stakeholders (not a limited group or selection)
Frequently Asked Questions
Why do I see "Anonymous stakeholder" instead of a name?
Why do I see "Anonymous stakeholder" instead of a name?
Your role either only has access to a subset of stakeholders, or your company has added that stakeholder to the Anonymous stakeholders list in Company Settings. Ask your account Owner or Admin if you need broader access.
I'm a Viewer role type but I see anonymised data in reports. Why?
I'm a Viewer role type but I see anonymised data in reports. Why?
This happens when your company has configured Company Anonymised stakeholders and this anonymisation type applies to the Viewer role type. Removing company anonymised stakeholders will make all stakeholders visible.
Does anonymisation carry over to exports and locked reports?
Does anonymisation carry over to exports and locked reports?
Yes. CSV/Excel exports and locked report previews and downloads show the same masked identity fields as the in-app report for that same user.
Can restricted users still filter or group by stakeholder?
Can restricted users still filter or group by stakeholder?
Yes. Filtering, sorting, and grouping still work as normal; only the identifying fields (name, address, and similar custom fields) are replaced with the anonymous placeholder.