It’s time to talk about eIDAS…

Published: Monday 27th June 2016

What does eIDAS mean?

On July 1st eIDAS will come into play, and this regulation will come into direct effect on businesses and citizens across the EU. What does the new regulation mean? How does it affect you? Do you need to do anything? Let’s explain…

What’s eIDAS Regulation?

eIDAS oversees electronic identification and trust services for electronic transactions in the European Union’s internal market. Yep. What does this mean for you? Well, before July 1st all companies in the EU had to comply with each other’s e-Signature regulations. eIDAS now means that all standards across the EU will be the same.

Happy days! Now, for example, if you’re sending a document to Germany you won’t have to check that their regulations match ours because they already will.

So… does this affect you?

Does this mean that Signable has to change? Does this mean that you have to do anything different when it comes to sending contracts?

Short answer – no.

From a technical point of view, eIDAS doesn’t change a huge amount. There are still three types of electronic signatures.

Standard Electronic Signature – any form of verification with evidence
Advanced Electronic Signature – as above but also backed by a “digital signature” (which is different) which is in the sole control of the signer.
Qualified Electronic Signature – as above, however, the digital signature comes from a company on the ‘Qualified Provider’ list.

At the moment, Signable provides Standard Electronic Signatures, and the main technical change that will be happening before 1st July is that from then, all PDF’s will be encrypted using a “digital signature”.

This means that you won’t have to be reliant on Signable being in business to prove that a PDF was signed via an electronic signature. This change isn’t required by eIDAS, but it does make sense to start offering other forms of electronic signature. Don’t you agree?

More good news?

You don’t have to worry about anything. Any changes that need to be made have been from a technical standpoint, and have already been made to your software. So the way your electronic signatures are sent out have already been updated, are already compliant and won’t cost you anything extra.

So, to summarize: