Advanced OR qualified electronic signature? What are the risks and benefits of each? In order to answer these questions, we must first understand the technical aspects behind the two categories of signatures, namely the way in which they work, as established by the eIDAS Regulation no. 910/2014.

And to dispel the myths created around electronically signed digital documents, Constantin Burdun (Deputy CEO of certSIGN) presented at the “Risks vs. benefits in using various types of electronic signatures” webinar – organized on June 10, 2021 by certSIGN in partnership with STOICA & Asociaţii, precisely these technical aspects in order to clarify the notion of “advanced electronic signature”, by comparison with the notion of “qualified electronic signature”.

Why is such an approach necessary? Because, as the certSIGN speaker pointed out in the first event in the “Law and Digital Transformation” series, there are a number of practical risks that can arise:

“We do not have a standardized mechanism that softwares used worldwide to know to display information such as ‘this signature is an advanced signature.’ You have to go further as a user to try to identify how to check the four conditions to know if a signature is really advanced or not.

Things are not the same with the qualified signature. […] With Adobe it is very clear that it is a qualified signature according to Regulation 910/2014 and the source is European Trusted List. If you do not see such a thing on a document, you can be sure that the signature in that document is not qualified but you do not know and do not have additional information if it is advanced or if it is not advanced, unless you go through a certain process [n.a. verification] which may be more difficult or easier depending on the technical and procedural way in which that signature was created. “

We invite you to fully watch the intervention of Mr. Constantin Burdun, in which you will find explained in an easy to understand way, with specific examples, the particularities and effects of each type of electronic signature, respectively:

• definitions according to Regulation 910/2014;
• types vs categories of electronic signatures;
• the technical and procedural mechanisms (technology) through which an electronic signature is made and their importance;
• examples of types of electronic signatures
• the risks of using a type of non-advanced (“simple”) and advanced electronic signature;
• comparative analysis category – type – risks – benefits of electronic signature;
• what the European Commission wants through the proposed amendments to the eIDAS Regulation no. 910 / 2014 presented at the beginning of June, with an emphasis on facilitating the use of qualified trust services in all EU Member States and creating uniform conditions for their provision.