Digital Signature Laws in India

Digital signature is electronically generated and can be used to make sure the veracity and legitimacy of data. The dawn of information technology revolutionized the whole world, India is not an exception to it; as technological activism is the social behavior in India.

IT Act Provisions Related to Digital Signature

Section 3 of IT Act, made the provision for it as: Authentication of electronic records.-

(1) Subject to the provisions of this section, any subscriber may authenticate an electronic record by affixing his digital signature.

In IT Act, chapter 3 related to electronic governance, sections 4 and 5 are quite relevant.

Section 4 made the provision for Legal recognition of electronic records — where any law provides that information or any other matter shall be in writing, typewritten or printed form then not-withstanding anything contained in such law, given requirement shall be deemed to have been satisfied if such information or matter is—

(a) rendered or made available in an electronic form; and

(b) accessible so as to be usable for a subsequent reference

Section 5 Legal recognition of [electronic signatures] — where law provides that information or any other matter shall be authenticated by affixing the signature or any document should be signed or bear the signature of any person then, notwithstanding anything contained in such law, such requirement shall be deemed to have been satisfied, if such information or matter is authenticated by means of [electronic signatures] affixed in such manner as may be prescribed by the Central Government.

Digital Signature Vs. Digital Certificate

Digital signatures are based on three pointers for authentication – Privacy, Non repudiation and Integrity in the virtual world, while the objectives of digital certificate are the authentication of documents, and bind the person who is putting the digital signature, which based on public key cryptography requires two separate keys, as secret and public. However, both the keys are linked together, one key encrypts the plain text, and another decrypts the cipher text, and neither key can perform both the functions. The other difference is digital signature is an electronic process of signing an electronic document while a Digital Certificate is a computer based record which is the identification of certifying agency or the identity of subscriber

Digital Signature Vs. Electronic Signature

The Information Technology Amendment Bill 2006, replaces the word “Digital” with the word “Electronic” at several places in the principal act, which creates a slight difference between the two, electronic signature is wide in nature, while the digital signature is one of the many kinds of electronic signature.

Section 2(ta) “electronic signature” means authentication of any electronic record by a subscriber by means of an electronic technique specified in the second schedule and includes digital signature and section 2(p) defined “Digital Signature Certificate” means a Digital Signature Certificate issued Under sub-section (4) of section 35.

The Indian Evidence Act and Digital Signature

After the IT Act 2000, it was necessary to make an applicable amendment in the Indian Evidence act, to make it compatible.

Section 3 in the definition of “Evidence”, for the words “all documents produced for the inspection of the Court”, the word “all document including electronic records produced for the inspection of the Court”

Section 47A, says when the court has to form an opinion as to the digital signature or any person, the opinion of the certifying authority which has issued the Digital Signature Certificate is a relevant fact. It means while drawing the conclusion, court gives the weight of the digital signature as a relevant fact.

Further 67A proof as to digital signature – except in the case of a secure digital signature, if the digital signature of any subscriber is alleged to have been affixed to an electronic record the fact that such digital signature is the digital signature of the subscriber must be proved.

Section 85B exhibits the positive presumption as  Presumption as to electronic records and digital signatures.- (1) In any proceedings involving a secure electronic record, the Court shall presume unless contrary is proved, that the secure electronic record has not been altered since the specific point of time to which the secure status relates.

Indian Penal Code

Section 464 Making a false document: A person is said to make a false document or false electronic record—

First — who dishonestly or fraudulently-

• Makes or transmits any electronic record or part of any electronic record;
• affixes any [electronic signature] on any electronic record;makes any mark denoting the execution of a document or the authenticity of the  [electronic signature],

with the intention of causing it to be believed that such a document or a part of document, electronic record or  [electronic signature] was made, signed, sealed, executed, transmitted or affixed by or by the authority of a person by whom or by whose authority he knows that it was not made, signed, sealed, executed or affixed; or

Secondly —Who, without lawful authority, dishonestly or fraudulently, by cancellation or otherwise, alters a document or an electronic record in any material part thereof, after it has been made, executed or affixed with  [electronic signature] either by himself or by any other person, whether such person be living or dead at the time of such alteration; or

Thirdly —Who dishonestly or fraudulently causes any person to sign, seal, execute or alter a document or an electronic record or to affix his  [electronic signature] on any electronic record knowing that such person by reason of unsoundness of mind or intoxication cannot, or that by reason of deception practiced upon him, he does not know the contents of the document or electronic record or the nature of the alteration.]

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Digital Signature Certificates are issued under Sub Section 4 of Section 35 of the IT Act

New Delhi: The Controller of Certifying Authorities suspended three digital certificates issued by the National Informatics Centre Certifying Authority (NIC-CA) to prevent their misuse, Parliament was informed.
Digital Signature Certificates (DSCs) are issued by Certifying Authorities for electronic authentication of users, Communication and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad told Lok Sabha. The Controller of Certifying Authorities, which is appointed under the Information Technology Act, 2000, licences Certifying Authorities to issue Digital Signature Certificates. Digital Signature Certificates are issued under Sub Section 4 of Section 35 of the IT Act and they facilitate e-commerce and e-filing of documents through authentication of users and their transactions, he added. "Three certificates issued to NIC-CA were suspended by CCA (Controller of Certifying Authorities. The unauthorised certificates that had been issued, were revoked by the NIC-CA. This was done to prevent misuse," Prasad said.

The incident has been investigated and the findings suggest that the perpetrators made an electronic intrusion in to the CA systems from outside India, he added. "NIC-CA has been asked to revamp their infrastructure from all aspects -- technical, physical and procedural," Prasad said. Besides, an advisory has been issued to all Certifying Authorities to examine and wherever necessary, strengthen security controls in the infrastructure used for Digital Signature Certificates issuance, the Minister added.
Last month, Google and Microsoft had complained about the unauthorised Digital Signature Certificates issued by NIC-CA. Google in a blog post had said: "On Wednesday, July 2, we became aware of unauthorised digital certificates for several Google domains. "The certificates were issued by NIC of India, which holds several intermediate CA certificates trusted by the Indian Controller of Certifying Authorities (India CCA)." Similarly, Microsoft said it is aware of improperly issued SSL certificates that could be used in attempts to spoof content or perform phishing attacks. "SSL certificates were improperly issued by NIC, which operates subordinate CAs under root CAs operated by Government of India's Controller of Certifying Authorities, which are CAs present in the Trusted Root Certification Authorities Store," it added.

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E-filing of ITR: Taxpayers To Get Digital Signature

To avoid the hassle of sending a printed copy of the e-file return by post, the department of income tax has decided to enter the premises of the digital signature for taxpayers. The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has decided to implement the new mechanism before the end of the next financial year to March 2015.

CBDT will contact the Union ministries of law and communications and information technology to establish the requirements of the position and the legal technology to new protocols for e-returns-ITRV-is operationalized.

A digital signature verifies the identity of the sender and is created by paying a fee that requires periodic renewal. Therefore, this is perceived as a burden on the salaried class and other small taxpayers.

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What is Digital Signature ?

A electronic signature (digital signature) is a mathematical scheme to demonstrate the authenticity of a digital message or document. A valid digital signature gives a recipient reason to believe that the message was created by a known sender, so that the sender can not deny having sent the message (authentication and non-repudiation) and that the message has not been altered in transit (integrity). Digital signatures are commonly used for software distribution, financial transactions, and in other cases where it is important to detect forgery or tampering.

Digital signatures are often used to implement electronic signatures, a broad term that refers to electronic data that carries the intent of a firm, but not all electronic signatures use digital signatures. In some countries, including the United States, India, Brazil, and members of the European Union, electronic signatures have legal value.

Digital signatures use a type of asymmetric cryptography. For messages sent through an insecure channel, properly implemented digital signature gives the receiver reason to believe the message was sent by the claimed sender. Digital signatures are equivalent to traditional handwritten signatures in many respects, but properly implemented digital signatures are more difficult to forge than the handwritten type. Digital signature schemes in the sense used here are cryptographically based, and must be implemented properly to be effective. Digital signatures can also provide non-repudiation, which means that the signer can not successfully claim that did not sign a message, while also claiming their private key remains secret; In addition, some non-repudiation systems offer a time stamp for the digital signature, so even if the private key is exposed, the signature is valid. Digitally signed messages may be anything representable as a bitstring: examples include electronic mail, contracts, or a message sent via some other cryptographic protocol.

A digital signature scheme typically consists of three algorithms:

1. A generation algorithm that selects a private key uniformly at random from a set of possible private keys key way. The algorithm outputs the private key and a corresponding public key.
2. A signing algorithm that, given a message and a private key, produces a signature.
3. A signature verification algorithm that, given a message, public key and a signature, either accepts or rejects the claim that the message for authenticity.

Two main properties are required. First, the authenticity of a signature generated from a fixed message and fixed private key can be verified using the corresponding public key. Secondly, it must be computationally infeasible to generate a valid signature for a game without knowing the private key of that party.

The applications of digital signature

As organizations move away from paper documents with ink signatures or seals of authenticity, digital signatures can provide additional guarantees of evidence for the origin, identity and status of an electronic document, as well as recognition of consent informed and approval by a signatory. The Government Printing Office of the United States (GPO) publishes electronic versions of the budget, public and private laws, and bills with digital signature. Universities including Penn State, the University of Chicago and Stanford publish electronic student transcripts with digital signatures.

Below are some common reasons for applying a digital signature to communications:
Authentication-Although messages may often include information about the entity sending a message, that information may not be accurate. Digital signatures can be used to authenticate the source of messages. When ownership of a digital signature secret key is bound to a specific user, a valid signature shows that the message was sent by that user.

Integrity-In many cases, the sender and recipient of a message may have a need for confidence that the message has not been altered during transmission. Although encryption hides the contents of a message, it may be possible to change an encrypted message without understanding it.

No-repudiation Non-repudiation, or more specifically the non-repudiation of origin is an important aspect of the digital signature. For this property, an entity that has entered some information can not deny at a later time signing. Similarly, access to the public key not only allow the fraudulent party to fake a valid signature.

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