CasperSign — Immutable Document Signatures on the Blockchain

ChronoLogic
ChronoLogicNetwork
Published in
4 min readMay 3, 2021

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The document signing process plays a crucial role as it guarantees the creation of binding obligations between the signing parties. Though many online documents signing solutions provide secure electronic signatures, it is entirely different from digital signatures. An electronic signature can be a scanned image of a handwritten signature, but a digital signature uses mathematical algorithms to prove the authenticity.

Plenty of digital signing services like DocuSign and HelloSign already exist that can help to sign legal documents. All such document signing platforms allow its users to sign documents securely and also provide cloud storage for the signed documents.

Blockchain, on the other hand, can enter the document signing industry by offering another layer of security. By using private keys between the document creator and signer, documents can be managed securely by approved parties. Blockchain uses the concept of hash which is like a fingerprint for every block. Every time a block is added to the chain, a hash gets generated for it. Tampering with any block causes the hash address to get changed. As a result, all blocks containing the previous hash become invalid.

With blockchain document signing, there is no need to blindly trust third parties, neither for timestamping nor for storing signatures. It can be possible to replace the third party and prevent anyone from going back and track records in case of manipulation or disputes by developing a blockchain document signing solution.

And we are happy to announce that the ChronoLogic team has already started to build such a tool on top of the Casper Network that is going to be integrated with HelloSign.

Meet CasperSign

CasperSign is a blockchain-based solution allowing users to digitally sign confidential documents on the Casper Blockchain.

For each document signed using CasperSign, a public transaction will take place in the background. The transaction will contain the hash of the signed document in the transaction notes. This transaction is then appended to the blockchain along with the timestamp. The timestamping serves as the document’s proof of existence, securing the integrity of your document where any tampering/altering can be mathematically proven. Since all hashes are anchored to a decentralized and distributed ledger technology, all documents can be verified virtually forever.

Sign your business documents on HelloSign as usual — CasperSign will take care of the blockchain-based timestamping in the background!

A detailed audit trail is collected in all stages of the signing process and is attached to the signed digital document. The cryptographic hash of the signed document is sent to a public Casper Blockchain.

Document secrecy

At this point you might be asking yourself — Ok, but will my document be exposed to the public with blockchain timestamping?

The answer is — No. Only the hash of the signed document will be added to the public blockchain, not the document itself. We use the SHA 256 algorithm to compute a hash of your files. This is done in your browser so the contents of your files remain confidential.

No chance of tampering

Blockchain is known for the high-level security it provides to all its users and the solutions that are built on it. It will not allow any kind of tampering to be done and keeps a record of every activity done with a single document.

CasperSign stores the SHA 256 hash of your email, the SHA 256 hash of your file, and a timestamp on the Casper Blockchain.

Verification Tool

With the CasperSign verification tool, you can upload a signed document and easily verify its authenticity. The validator will detect if the document has been modified after it was signed.

By making documents verifiable and independently auditable, they become more valuable. In case there ever is a dispute about which version of a document was agreed and signed, you need to be able to validate which one is the original one.

We will be ready to release CasperSign soon — we are aiming that it will stimulate enterprise and developer adoption of blockchain technology and attract more people into the network.

Stay tuned for future updates!

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