ESIGN Act

The 2000 US federal statute establishing that a signature is not invalid merely because it is electronic.

The Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act (ESIGN), enacted in 2000, provides that in transactions affecting interstate or foreign commerce, a signature, contract or record may not be denied legal effect solely because it is in electronic form.

It is technology-neutral: it does not prescribe how a signature must be produced. What it does impose, in consumer transactions, is a consent regime — the consumer must affirmatively consent to receive records electronically, after disclosures, and the record must be retainable and reproducible.

For software, the practical consequence is that consent is a thing to be recorded as its own timestamped event, not inferred from the fact that someone signed. A system that cannot show when consent was obtained and what was disclosed is doing the easy part of ESIGN and not the demanding part.

UETA is the parallel uniform state law, adopted in most US states, covering transactions not reached by federal commerce. The two are broadly consistent.

Last reviewed 2026-09-18. Pactlyra produces a detailed evidence record for every completed document. Electronic signature validity depends on your jurisdiction, the document type, and how the transaction is carried out; nothing here is legal advice.