Why should I sign my electronic documents?

Let us say you are an independent researcher who has developed a scientific formula and prepared a paper on the subject. You need to get the formula patented with the Indian Patents Office. You will need to sign the document for it to be considered an authentic work and also to prove that it was indeed created by you.

What if you don’t take it seriously and simply mail your paper to the Patents Office without signing it? Of course, the Patents Office will simply dismiss your work and get on with other applications. Worse, if the research paper accidentally lands into wrong hands before it reaches the intended recipient and there is no signature, this person might sign it and claim credit, putting to naught all your hard work and creativity. 

Now if you had to send the same piece of work electronically, but you didn’t have access to email, how would you send it? May be you would save it to a pen drive and courier the pen drive through a recognised courier company, wouldn’t you? Does that still prove that you had developed the formula or prepared the research paper? To conclusively establish that you are the one you claim to be, you must sign the electronic document digitally. And that does not mean scanning the physically signed research paper. You actually need to procure a digital signature from a Certifying Authority and apply it to the relevant document within the validity period. How you mail the document to the recipient is secondary.