Better Digital Signatures
Digital Processes. Manual signing?
As part of todays Digital Transformation many manual processes are optimized and digitized to make them more flexible and to reduce overhead and lead times.
In the new agile enterprise manual signing is no longer an option. Stop printing multiple copies of a document, then sign them, carry or send them for counter-signing. And then after they’ve been signed, to scan them and archive these signed documents manually.
You need a better Digital Signature solution.
Disadvantages of traditional solutions
Firstly, these traditional signatures can only be added to PDF or Microsoft Word documents. Only these files offers support for storing the signed certificates.
Secondly, you need to get an expensive certificate from a limited group of Adobe approved central Certification Authorities (CA).
Besides this dependency on a central CA, you are also dependent on a central Time-stamping server.
Another drawback is that the digital signature is stored inside the document. This means that whoever needs to check if a document is signed, will have full read access to all the content in the document.
Also, because the document changes with each signature, signing documents in parallel is not possible: everybody needs to sign the document sequentially.
Together with our partner Off-Blocks, we developed a mobile-first solution to secure documents, photos, audio, video, designs, code, etc., by directly signing the data itself with a Blockchain-backed secure Digital ID.
Better Digital Signatures
Our Blockchain-based solution offers the same functionality and the same legal basis as these traditional solutions, but we add important functionalities to create much a better digital signature solution.
Sign any digital object
First of all, we support Digital Signatures for any type of digital object, not just PDF and office documents, but also drawings, pictures, videos, audio, or just any digital object.
This enables many new possibilities to secure the authenticity of all those digital data and files we are exchanging in the new digital economy.
Additional information on Blockchain
We also enable you to add additional information to the transaction on Blockchain, independent of the digital object.
For example an audit-trail, the identities of the signatories, a status or a geo-location or basically any other value or meta data about the transaction.
Independent verification
With the registration of the signing action on a Blockchain, the Digital Signature also lives independently of the object, which enables independent verification, with or without the necessity of having access to the object itself.
This enables independent verification, with or without the necessity of actually having access to the object itself. You can proof, and others can verify, the authenticity of the signing process with a Blockchain notarized transaction log.
It also enables you to keep the original information safe. A confidential document doesn’t need to be shared to proof that it has been signed. It can be kept confidential.
Better Approval solutions
Since the object is not changed by the signature, it also enables you to sign documents in parallel and implement business rules based on mandates, 4-eyes, majority vote, veto, seniority, etc.
This gives you control over the actual process, free from the limitations of the traditional solutions.