Thursday, January 9, 2003

Autograph (identifier) vs. Signature (identifier with intent) UETA and Digital Signatures. Many people have never heard of the Uniform Electronic Transactions Act, or UETA. Even so, if you engage in any kind of transaction on the Internet, even non-commercial ones like downloading open source software, it has affected you. [Windley's Enterprise Computing Weblog] "Most of us take our signature quite seriously. At some point in your life you probably practiced writing it so that it looked the way you wanted it to." Yes, most of us take our signature quite seriously. As Windley notes, at some point in our lives we usually practiced writing it so that it looked the way we wanted it to. Over time we come to intuit the fine grained distinctions of what a signing might imply. We gradually come to understanding that one might sign simply to identify your presence (a meeting sign-in sheet), or a mildly legal signing (accepting the package delivered), or a more serious signing (a car rental) or a really, really serious signing (a will). The level of identity needed and the level of intent implied can vary considerably. And all of this e-signing will evolve much as physical signing has evolved. One reason that notaries came into being was to have an "official" witness for those that could not sign, that could only make their mark with indicated intent without self-authenticating identity. 6:40:50 AM

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