Fastman Digital Signatures FAQ

Fastman’s Digital Signatures OpenText Content Suite is a fully supported solution that enables organisations to increase ROI of their OpenText Content Suite system by leveraging the leading digital signature platform standards-based on Public Key Infrastructure (PKI), and the Signature Appliance by DocuSign.

Through this solution, users can digitally sign documents in Content Suite directly from the user interface, via workflows, or integrated with business solutions such as OpenText Transmittals and OpenText Contracts Management.

Digital signatures provide the means to verify the authenticity (the signer) and integrity (content hasn’t been altered since signing) of a document.  To provide such assurance, a digital signature must be unique to the signer, allow verification of the identity of the signer, tamper proof and linked to the content signed.

Conversely, an Electronic Signature is simply electronic images embedded or logically associated with a document.  Used alone it offers none of the assurances a digital signature provides and does not provide the same level of authentication or verification.

As a result, Electronic Signature solutions must enforce additional process and audit trails on activity to meet requirements such as those required by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).  Digital Signatures avoid this by embedding the necessary compliance in the technology itself, enabling greater flexibilty in work processes while providing a higher level of security and verification.

The document signing process is based on the Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) industry standard.  Signers are allocated a private key available only to them for signing.  During the signing process a “fingerprint” based upon the content of the document being signed.  These two are used in combination to create a digital signature unique to the document and its content.

The signer also has a public key – available to recipients of signed documents.  This key is used to validate the signature, which involves matching the public key to the espoused signer and that the digital signature remains consistent with the content.

Yes. This is a primary goal of digital signatures, to allow users receiving content, both within and external to your organisation, to know it is authentic and has not been tampered with.

Yes. When a document is signed a “fingerprint” of the document content is generated as one of the first steps in the signing process. This “fingerprint” is generated within your organisation, such that the document itself does not need to be transmitted externally for the digital signing to be completed.

In recent years, most countries have put in place laws covering digital signatures.  However, just like ink signatures, digitally signed document are still assessed for it’s “admissibility”, which assesses criteria such as intent of the signatory, rights of the signer, control of access and veracity of content.

With the proper standard operating procedures in place and by leveraging the CoSign product, the Fastman Digital Signature solutions can comply with e-sign, EU directives and VAT law, FDA 21CFR part 11, HIPAA, USDA and SOX.

Signature profiles are used to configure signing behaviour and allow association of document types (e.g. PDF, Word), document locations as well as Content Suite Categories and Classifications. These allow flexible rules to be put in place to configure what documents can be signed, who can sign them and what signing reasons are relevant.

Yes. All signing events are added to Content Suite’s audit trail. The auditing events allow users to know when a document was signed and reviewed (verification the signature is valid).

Yes. The standard Content Suite document function menu is extended to include an “Initiate Signing Workflow” allowing users to quickly route documents requiring digital signature through Content Suite’s workflow process.

Yes, for Adobe Acrobat PDF documents. This allows signing documents where the document does not already have a defined signature field or zone.

Yes. Online help context sensitive help is available directly from within Content Suite covering the document signing, workflow initiation and signature validation processes.

No. The signing process within Content Suite is server side. If required a plugin for signing of documents directly within Microsoft Office is available.

Content Suite 9.7.1 or higher, including CS16 and CS16.2
Content Suite Database – Microsoft SQL Server or Oracle (versions as supported by OpenText)
Content Suite non-core (i.e. additional module) dependencies – none

Digital Signatures for OpenText Content Suite has been developed as a joint project between Fastman and DocuSign.

Fastman is the global licensor of the solution and is responsible for its distribution, maintenance, and support.  We are also an authorised DocuSign reseller and we work closely with DocuSign themselves and the DocuSign partner community in all regions of the world.