Simple Electronic Signature SES

No. The word simple does not appear in the regulation. Article 3 of eIDAS defines three things: an electronic signature in point (10), an advanced electronic signature in point (11) and a qualified electronic signature in point (12).

Simple is the label the market has given to a signature that fits the first definition and goes no further. Some providers say standard or basic instead. The label is useful shorthand, but it has no legal content of its own. In a contract clause or a policy it is more precise to write "electronic signature within the meaning of Article 3(10)" than to rely on a term the law does not contain.

Almost anything electronic that a person uses to sign. The definition in Article 3(10) has three parts: data in electronic form, attached to or logically associated with other electronic data, and used by the signatory to sign. The signatory is a natural person (Article 3(9)).

A name typed under an email fits that description. So does a ticked box next to "I agree", a signature drawn with a finger on a screen, or a scanned signature pasted into a PDF. The definition sets no requirement for a certificate, a device or an identity check. What matters is that the person used the data to sign.

It cannot be dismissed for being electronic. Article 25(1) says an electronic signature shall not be denied legal effect or admissibility as evidence solely because it is in electronic form, or because it is not a qualified signature.

That is a narrower promise than it sounds. The article stops a court from refusing to look at the signature. It does not make the signature equal to a handwritten one, which Article 25(2) reserves for qualified signatures. It also leaves national and EU rules on form in place (Article 2(3)). Where a law requires a document to be signed by hand or in a set form, that law decides whether a simple signature will do.

On its own, very little about who signed. Nothing in the definition ties the signature to one person, and nothing reveals whether the document was altered afterwards. Anyone with access to the mailbox can type the name. Anyone holding the image can paste it.

The proof therefore has to come from around the signature. In a dispute, the party relying on it would turn to the surrounding record: the email account the document was sent to, the log kept by the signing tool, the correspondence before and after. Each of these shows that an account or a device was involved. None of them shows which person was at the keyboard. This is why a simple signature gives the weakest evidence of the three levels, even though it is the easiest to collect.

In two situations. The first is when a rule demands more. National law may prescribe a form for the document, and a member state may require an advanced signature for an online public service (Article 27(1)).

The second is when the identity of the signer is the thing most likely to be contested. A simple signature suits a document where both sides know each other, the amounts are modest, and a denial would be implausible. It suits a document less well when the signer is a new client, signs from abroad, or commits to something they may later regret.

The three levels are compared point by point in the table under qualified electronic signature.