SPECIAL REPORT
Virtual vault
Chesapeake’s IntelliSafe Puts Lock and Key on Digital Signatures


By Rita Frankenberry
Inside Business - Hampton Roads
Monday November 11, 2002

According to Scott Bleakley, a consultant with IntelliSafe Technologies, by 2010, more than 80 percent of the world’s industrial countries will be putting John Hancocks on business contracts digitally, completing international deals without ever leaving the office.

“I don’t think our kids will know how to use a pen,” Bleakley said. “You simply won’t use blue ink on this type of transactions anymore.”

The transactions Bleakley is referring to are many and varied, which is why IntelliSafe Technologies, a division of Chesapeake-based Compass Technology Management, decided to create IntelliSafe Vault, a digital signature software. With IntelliSafe Vault, companies are able not only to sign documents wherever there is Internet access, but also to securely store documents and files for the lifetime of the document.

The software also offers businesses the opportunity to cut operational costs. Jana Harp, product marketing manager with IntelliSafe Technologies, said that in addition to cutting costs on express delivery charges (companies using the software will no longer need couriers to transport time-sensitive contracts) businesses also will save money on costly storage fees. The vault will keep those digitally signed documents secure for their lifetime, allowing only authorized signers and viewers to access them, maintaining the documents’ authenticity and integrity, while providing a full audit trail with a time and date stamp on all document activities.

Bleakley said with all the recent headlines CEOs have been making in cases like Enron, he expects the exhaustive audit trail will be an additional selling point for the software. As CEOs become more accountable in the coming years, all records and transactions will come under increased scrutiny.

“CEOs are going to have to sign off on everything now, so I think a lot of these documents are going to be digitized,” Bleakley said. “[This software] can be used to deter any type of corporate fraud, and that will help drive the need for the application.”

In 2000, the government passed the E-Sign Act, and the United Nations passed the UN Model Law on Electronic Signatures. This legislation legitimized the concept of digital signatures not only within the United States, but worldwide.

“The E-Sign Act eliminated the need for [blue-ink signatures] because digital signatures are now legal and enforceable,” said Peter Natale, vice president of corporate products with Compass Technology. “[The vault] reduces the costs of labor associated with storage and also there’s the speed factor, because you can complete a document in minutes.”

The Government Paperwork Elimination Act is one of the reasons Compass Technology decided to create the software. The legislation requires government agencies and their partners to automate transactions by October 2003 by using electronic forms, electronic filing and electronic signatures to conduct official business. Many of Compass’ partners with government contracts approached Compass seeking the software necessary to meet this deadline.

It is expected that 45 percent of government agencies will meet the Government Paperless Act deadline, and the creation of Compass’ software will help them.

“All of that paperwork is eliminated because all of those contracts and documents can be signed wherever there is Internet access,” said Harp.

The Department of Defense has begun issuing smart cards to the U.S. military and is expected to distribute 3.5 million more by October 2003. These smart cards, called common access cards, act as ID cards and provide users access to Department of Defense sites, networks and computer systems. The cards combine identification, physical access and computer access capabilities on a single chip.

Government agencies and their partners are not the only ones that can benefit from the technology. Other markets that will benefit include financial services, companies looking to cut express delivery costs and the health-care industry.

Right now, Compass is working on altering the software so individuals can have digital access to their clinical records 24 hours a day. This way, Natale said, if a person is on a ski vacation in Colorado and breaks a leg and needs to see a doctor, he will have his medical records with him on a small token that plugs into the back of his computer. Natale said this is more secure than the filing methods found in most doctors’ offices where patient records are filed in folders.

“We see a lot of applications in a lot of different markets,” Natale said.

In addition, the vault is the only digital signature software program able to verify a signer’s signature is authentic and original, Natale said.

“What our software does, is it allows you to sign in the vault and the document never leaves the vault,” Harp said. “The original document stays in the vault, and there cannot be any tampering because we maintain the document.”

Once signed, the document is actually stored on a company’s server, or some other host facility. If these servers are not in a secure location, the vault’s documents will not be either.

Natale said Compass’ program ensures that a file is untouched, whereas with other similar existing software programs, files can be manipulated once they are signed.

“We take those digital signatures, and we wrap them and put security layers around them. We encrypt them so that once the signatures are applied, we make sure those signatures are never touched,” Natale said. “We’re that safety deposit box that keeps that document safe in the digital world. And that’s extremely valuable, especially when you’re dealing with high-value documents.”