With E-Sign's passage, electronic signatures essentially gained equal legal status with those created by using pen and paper. Businesses can now accept electronic signatures in the transaction process, thereby enabling faster, easier, more efficient, and less expensive alternatives to conduct online trade. It's up to the sender and receiver to agree upon the form of signature acceptable to both. However, corporate security professionals and individual consumers must look out for operational inconsistencies, such as software conflicts, that vendors won't disclose when rolling out their new signature products and services. Digital signatures offer a greater degree of security than handwritten signatures because recipients of digitally signed messages can confirm message origination and can also verify that messages were not altered.
Authenticity can be granular from document down to packet level.
Online commercial interaction can take place from negotiation to relationship agreement through operational transaction certification until ultimate mutual or unilateral withdrawal. Innovative competition will be dynamically rewarded. Unfortunately, the wide variation of acceptable signatures enabled by law places further pressure on corporate security professionals to closely oversee signature conveyance to ensure transactions cannot be repudiated or later disowned with signature forgery claims. Here lies a conundrum. Copyright 2001 INT Media Group, Incorporated All Rights Reserved.