Applicants fail to sign up for digital signature licence

Ashu Kumar in New Delhi

The infotech slowdown seems to have brought the digital signature process in India to a grinding halt with virtually no takers of the licences to become the certifying authority coming forward.

Even three months after the licence process was kicked off, not even a single company out of more than 200 organisations, which collected licence applications, have come back to complete the formalities, according to government sources.

On the other hand, the office of the controller of certification authorities (CCA) for digital signatures have prepared itself to roll out the licence process as soon as it receives an application.

According to a senior CCA official, the controller has not received any completed application so far from any company asking for a licence. “However, we are ready with all the resources. The technical team is already in place with an assistant controller and a deputy controller. The panel of auditors have also been selected for scruitinising the applicants’ facilities. In fact, we are ready to receive the applications now and even if we get an application today, we can issue a licence,” said the CCA official.

Giving the reasons for the zero response from industry, Verisign affiliate in India, SafeScrypt managing director Atul Saran told The Financial Express that the market conditions and uncertainty about future can be a reason for companies not coming forward as it will involve major investments.

“However, there are a few stringent regulations like time stamping requirements and some out-sourcing and managed services related issues which have made the rules too complicated. This might have also put off a few companies,” he said.

However, SafeScrypt, which has already made substantial investments and have business plans in digital signature space, will go ahead and apply for the licence in next two months’ time, claimed Mr Saran. “We are preparing ourselves and hope to apply in next two months time “ he said.

eFE had reported in July that around 200 companies including Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited (MTNL), ABN AMRO Bank, Corporation Bank, Aptech, Data Access, Global e-services, Samtech, Balmer Lawrie & Company, Indian Telephone Industries (ITI), SafeScrypt and eCommneble have evinced interest in becoming the certifying authority for digital signatures and had procured applications from CCA.