Cross-border digital signature
What is the cross border digital signature?
In Estonia, digital signature and ID-card is widely used. Over 90 % of citizens in Estonia have the national ID-card with a smart chip and card owners can communicate with the government by electronic means through the qualified digital signature. The Estonian Qualified digital signature is equal to a handwritten digital signature therefore it can be used over the Internet when establishing new companies. In Estonia it is possible to start a new legal entity (a private limited company) in 12 minutes with your ID-card and a digital signature from your home. We found that in Portugal they have similar possibilities (a nationwide ID-card, a digital signature and online company registration). So we decided to cooperate on this matter and to accept each otherís digital signatures in the company registration portals (https://ettevotjaportaal.rik.ee/ ; www.portaldaempresa.pt ).
Why is it good and how does it make things better?
For example if you are from Portugal and you want to do business in Estonia and you do not have a private limited company, you can establish one with your Portuguese ID-card in Estonia without traveling to Estonia. In the same project we decided to accept the ID-card and digital signature from Belgium, Lithuania and Finland. You can establish a new legal entity with your Belgian, Finnish or Lithuanian ID-card in Estonia. This innovation has given us the know-how and opportunity to be the first in EU to implement such solution which is great advantage for Estonia.
| Every country in the EU has a different type of digital signature. We concentrated on those certificates and qualified signatures which are tied to the national ID-card and are equal to the Estonian digital signature. We realized that the format is different in each country, so it was decided that in Estonia only these foreign signatures are accepted that are equal to the Estonian digital signatures. | Also the format of digitally signed documents are different: Estonia: *.ddoc (unique format); Portugal: *.pdf, *.doc, *.odt. In Belgium it is *.pdf and in Finland: *.doc. In the Company Registration portal we let the entrepreneur sign the documents inside our portal. This way we can always decide which format we want the outcome to be (In Estonia *.ddoc). |
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1) The user inserts the ID-card into a reader and logs in. 2) The portal checks whether the authentication certificate provider is listed in the certificates server. 3) Certificate revocation is checked depending on the country from CRL list. 4) If the certificate is trustworthy, up-to date and has not been canceled then the user is allowed to enter the portal. |
1) After that the user starts the digital signing process. 2) The digital signature software turns to the Estonian CA OCSP server. 3) Depending on the country, service is forwarded to either the foreign CA OCSP service or the validation of certificate is checked with a local CA database. 4) The foreign CA answers to the Estonian CA which gives the answer back to the portal. 5) From here itís similar to the process of Estonian certificate validation after which the document will be signed digitally. |
Cross border digital signature.pdf (942.88kb)
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