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authentication procedures or commercially acceptable authentication procedures

agreed upon by the parties involved, it meets the following requirements:

1. It is uniquely linked to the signatory and to no other person;

2. It is capable of identifying its owner;

3. It is created using means of its owner and under his sole control; and

4. It is linked to the record to which it relates in such a manner that does not

allow modification to that record after signing without altering the signature

so that any change made after the time of signing is detectable.

In the UAE, the use and admissibility of electronic signatures is governed by Federal

Law No.1 of 2006 regarding Electronic Transactions and E-Commerce. This law defines

electronic signature in Article (1) as “any letters, numbers, symbols, voice or processing

system in Electronic form applied to, incorporated in, or logically associated with a Data

Message with the intention of authenticating or approving the same”. Article (17) states

that an electronic signature shall be treated as a Secure Electronic Signature if, through

the application of prescribed secure

In addition, Article (18) allows the parties to rely on an electronic signature or electronic

authentication certificate to the extent that such reliance is reasonable. It also provides

that the relying party in respect of such signature shall bear the legal consequences of

its failure to take reasonable and necessary steps to verify the validity and enforceability

of the certificate, as to whether it is suspended or revoked, and of observing any limita-

tions with respect to the certificate.

It should be noted here that the Electronic Transactions and E-Commerce law and all

subsequent regulations, regulatory policies, and legal instruments in UAE are intended

to be technologically neutral, hence the omission of a specific technology for secure

electronic signatures.

Later, the UAE Federal Law No. 36 of 2006 amended certain provisions of the Evidence

Law in Civil and Commercial Transactions issued by Federal Law No. 10 of 1992. Accord-

ing to this Law, both electronic signatures, and electronic writing, instruments and

documents shall have the same evidential weight as written signatures, and official

and customary writing and instruments respectively if they comply with the provisions

prescribed in the Federal Law No. (1) of 2006 concerning Electronic Transactions.

July 2018

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May 28, 2024