Anaksha Riya Mohan, LLM, School of Law, Christ University, Bangalore
ABSTRACT
The use of digital contracts has been on the rise due to several dynamic factors, such as technological developments and globalization. These factors play a dominant role in the growing trend of digitalization of commercial business models and transactions. Electronic signatures paved a remarkable rise to digital contracts and electronic records. E-commerce businesses depend on digital agreements to run their business transactions electronically. Section 2(1)(a) of the IT Act defines an electronic signature. As per this section, any mode of electronic authentication, as the Government prescribes from time to time, will be valid. They can make many forms and can be created by many technologies. Countries like Australia, Bermuda, Canada, and Ireland, as Governments from Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Philippines, the UK, etc. have enacted electronic signature legislation. This study focuses on how the electronic signature works and its importance shortly—as well as electronic signatures in cyberspace. Digital signatures have been included as a type of electronic signature. They are based on asymmetric or public key cryptography. They are capable of fulfilling the demand of burgeoning e-commerce by providing message authentication, integrity, and non-repudiation function and making it highly scalable. A digital signature is a two-way process involving two parties: the signor (creator of the digital signature) and the recipient (verifier of the digital signature). A digital signature is complete if and only if the recipient successfully verifies it. Digital signatures are legal only if issued under an Electronic Signature Certificate by Certifying Authority. Countries like Argentina, Colombia, Estonia, India, Italy, etc., have enacted digital signature legislation. An Electronic Signature Certificate is issued by the Certifying Authority to identify the subscriber of an electronic signature. The Digital Signature Certificate is the only valid form of Electronic Signature that can be issued. Section 2(1)(zg) of the IT Act defines ’subscriber.' A ‘subscriber’ is a person who is authorized by the Certifying Authority concerning the electronic signature. Concerning a Digital Signature Certificate, the subscriber is the person who is authorized to use that key pair. A Certifying Authority is a body the controller allows to issue an electronic signature certificate to a subscriber. The Certifying Authority is licensed by the controller via a ‘Root Certificate.' CA plays two key roles: first, it issues digital signatures to the subscriber. Secondly, it verifies the digital signature of a subscriber at the request of the recipient or the relying party. Section 38 of the IT Act deals with the Revocation of Digital Signatures and the conditions for revocation. When a digital signature is suspended or revoked, the Certifying Authority shall publish a notice of such suspension or revocation, as the case may be, in the repository specified in the Digital Signature Certificate for publication of such information. The implication of Electronic and Digital signatures has helped broaden the IT Act's scope to include new techniques in the cyber world.
Keywords: Electronic signature, Digital Signature, Subscriber, Certificate, Certifying Authority
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