Digital signatures: How we will use trust technology

The ink is barely dry on digital signature legislation, but it won’t be long before it is commonplace for Americans to replace paper signatures with their digital counterparts.

“The technology will be used by any consumer who wants to ensure the security of important transactions over the Internet. This includes transactions in the financial, legal and health care realm,” said Patrick Richard CEO of Xcert, a Walnut Creek, California secure-transaction technology company.

Richard said that includes the secure buying and selling of stocks online, transfer of medical records electronically and securely from one hospital to another. A person could also buy a new home where the buyer, seller, mortgage company and title company are in different locations. Closing documents could be digitally signed without all participants being in the same room.

“All of these have common elements—security, privacy, authentication and non-repudiation,” said Richard.

Consumers are likely to come across the technology through Web services that use secure technology built in to a server and Web browser.

As the technology matures, consumers will likely become able to do all kinds of transactions with their bank, their utility companies and any other business where paper is moved between business and customer.

Many trust technology companies did tests in the run up to the Oct. 1 activation of the eSign law.

For example, Bermuda-based Originals Online and a group of U.S. and Canadian companies associated with agriculture production and logistics participated in a test of an electronic document management and control system.

The participants spent a week in July performing dummy transactions using a computer and smart card provided by Originals Online.

Meanwhile, consumers are already using the technology, they just don’t know it.

“You and I don’t think of the digital signature technology the ATM (automatic teller machine) uses when it talks to the bank to get your cash to you,” said Mike Serbinis, chief security officer of Critical Path, a secure messaging and document company headquartered in San Francisco.

“Ultimately, that’s (how simple) the technology has to become,” he added.

Consumers who shop on-line already participate in electronic signature technology, too. A button click to approve a purchase on a Web page essentially equals signing a credit card slip. Under the various digital signature laws, a button click fits the definition of an electronic signature.

Where the technology really becomes useful for the consumer is in bill receipt and payment.

It can be also used for people who want to send secure e-mail.

“No message should go out without a digital signature,” said Farzaneh Edmiston, product-marketing manager for PGP, a subsidiary of Network Associates that makes secure e-mail software.

“You could create a message that looks like it’s from a person’s boss saying: ‘You are fired.’ ” Secure mail ensures that the sender is who they say they are.
A good comparison of secure e-mail software packages by is available on the Web at: [[www.cyberwalker.com/r/dig-sig.html]].