A system and method is provided to perform a routine when the user attempts to access any document in a database. When the user attempts to access any document in the database, a call to a function is performed to determine whether the user is allowed to access a local copy of the database. The function determines whether the database is a local database. If the function determines that the database is running on the user's local machine then the function determines whether the user has permission to access the local copy of the database by searching through individual and group access control files. If the user is authorized, the function allows the user to access the local copy of the database. However, if the user is not authorized, an error message is displayed and the user is denied access to the local database copy.