Electronic Signature Law in the UK
Legalesign eSignature Meets the eIDAS Standard for a Legally Binding Advanced Electronic Signature.
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On 1st February 2022 the Industry Working Group on eSignatures (managed from the Ministry of Justice) published its Interim Report. The consultation that arose from that has now finished and the final report is awaited.
On the 18th June 2020, the Law Commission updated their guidance on electronic signature to include tips on how to operate in practice. The note is targeted at legal professionals. Part of the cause has been the uptick in electronic signature use during the coronavirus crisis. We will have more analysis on this shortly. For more information on the update, click here to go to the Law Society's page on its updated position.
Other notes
We recommend businesses taken their own legal advice on their contract handling. For example, you may need to inform your signers that they have a ‘cooling off’ period (Legalesign has a place where you can add that text). Some contracts may need to be delivered to become effective so you need to make sure Legalesign email delivery is switched on and PDFs are attached. Some contracts may not be able to be signed by electronic signature. As far as possible Legalesign’s default settings will give the strongest legal offering. But individual sectors and contracts will have their own regulations to consider.
United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL)
An important body of background thinking on electronic signature and trust services is being developed by the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL), ’the core legal body of the United Nations system in the field of international trade law’. This body has a working group on electronic commerce that has done a large amount of work on the core concepts and theory of electronic signature in law and has drawn together an excellent set of documents for anyone thinking electronic signature and its adoption by states, and makes important reading alongside legislation.
Click here for UNCITRAL, UNCITRAL Working Group on Electronic Commerce.
If you are researching electronic signature law and want more information then get in touch.
Last updated: 3 October 2022
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