E-notarization plays strong component in digital economy

WITH the Covid-19 pandemic, supply chain disruptions, and tighter financial conditions putting the brakes on global economic growth, countries are quickly steering their priorities toward strengthening their digital economies to cushion the impacts of these events.

While it is a positive sign that countries are not asleep at the wheel, there is still a lot to do in developing a pathway toward a robust and sustainable digital economy.

This is according to lawyer Pierre Martin Reye, chief legal officer of Twala, an app that allows users to easily sign legally binding documents.

It is important to identify, assess and transform processes that would allow the public and private sectors to better participate in and contribute to the digital economic growth, and one of these processes is notarization.

“Notarial institutions play an important role in building our economy by helping organizations verify, validate, and add more legal weight to their contracts and transactions. However, our notarial processes still heavily rely on manual and paper-based procedures; people still need to go to the notary public in person to prove their identities and sign their physical documents. This is not only time-consuming but also costly,” he said.

“Considering the administrative nature of the majority of our notarial processes, there has always been an opportunity to digitalize them. Fortunately, we now have the technology to improve these processes while protecting their founding values and objectives,” he added.

E-notarization improves data security by eliminating the risk of natural hazards such as floods and destroying records.

“If a robust and sustainable digital economy is the destination we aim to reach, then putting in place efficient and secure processes and systems like enotarization is imperative to serve as our vehicle. We are fortunate to already have innovative technologies like blockchain to ensure the process’ integrity while strengthening it. What we only need now is a strong judicial push to move forward,” Reyes concluded.