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Wrangling over which government department will oversee the proposed E-signature law, has delayed passing the measure until just before the September election.
By : Roseanne Gerin

   The new legislative proposal on electronic signatures will likely be signed into law just before the parliamentary elections in early September, an advisor to the parliamentary subcommittee responsible for the proposal said last week.

   Piotr Rutkowski, a managing partner at Warsaw-based telecommunications consulting firm Rotel, said the Sejm’s communications subcommittee that drafted the e-signature legislation, might conclude its discussion on the proposal this week and submit it for a second reading. Following that, the proposal would be sent to the Senate and be passed “in the final moments in September” in a last-minute rush to push through the legislation before elections, he said.

   The members of the communications subcommittee previously expected the law to be passed by late spring or early summer, but prolonged discussion over which government body would be given the authority to oversee e-signature regulations delayed the proposal’s movement through the Sejm, the lower house of Parliament. The subcommittee has been reviewing the e-signature proposal since January.

   The government’s original draft of the e-signature legislation proposed that the Interior Ministry should oversee encryption regulations, while the Sejm’s initial proposal assigned the duty to the Communications Ministry. Last week the communications subcommittee reached a compromise, giving the authority to the Economy Ministry, Rutkowski said. However, parliamentarians still must vote on the final version.

   Karol Działoszyński, the Freedom Union (UW) deputy who chairs the Sejm’s communications subcommittee, could not be reached for comment.

   The legislation for e-signatures, the electronic equivalent of handwritten signatures, will create regulatory standards for online documents and transactions, establish a government body to oversee e-signature regulations and bring the issue in line with European Union legislation.

   “The greatest advantage of this law is that it raises the discussion about general information security,” Rutkowski said. “ It’s the first step toward making the discussion broader because you must (talk) about cryptography, the application of security, risk assessment on the treatment of the information and the other standards to be implemented in economic activity. The electronic signature is only a small tool that helps treat the information and economic activities.”