NDA stands for Non-Disclosure Agreement. It is also known as a Confidentially Agreement (CA), Confidential Disclosure Agreement (CDA), or Proprietary Information agreement (PIA)

These agreements are legal contracts between at least two parties who want to share confidential material, knowledge, or information with one another, but wish to restrict access to and by third parties.

This type of contract usually specifies the information to be guarded and the conditions under which the parties agree not to disclose it. An NDA creates a confidential relationship between the parties to protect confidential and proprietary information, which includes non-public business information and trade secrets.

There are three general types of NDA:

• Unilateral: sometimes referred to as a one-way NDA, this involves two parties, where only one party, i.e. the disclosing party, anticipates disclosing certain information to the other party, the receiving party, and requires that the information be protected from further disclosure.
• Bilateral: sometimes referred to as a mutual NDA or a two way NDA, this involves two parties where both parties anticipate disclosing information to one another that each intends to protect from further disclosure.
• Multilateral: this involves three or more parties, where at least one of the parties anticipates disclosing information to the other parties and requires that the information be protected from further disclosure by everyone else.

We recommend that you file the PPA before you share your product idea with anyone.