Author: Michael Jones

U.S. law enforcement agencies such as police departments, sheriffs, probation offices, prisons, prosecutors, and district attorneys are relying more and more on digital records.  In serving the public, LE agencies need to ensure data privacy and security no matter if their records are paper or digital.

ZorroSign offers a technology platform built on blockchain to support law enforcement, including digital signatures, documents, workflows and archives to enhance the privacy, security, and efficiency of any LE administrative process.

ZorroSign can help LE agencies with:

• Digital signatures across personnel records, payroll, budgeting, contracts, and finances
• Digital documents related to court commitments, jurisdictional and warrant transfers, and supporting depositions
• Expediting the collection of Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) statistics—providing officers in the field with an easy-to-use tool to scan licenses and automatically populate a digital ledger with all required UCR data
• An immutable audit trail for all LE, administrative, and legal documents in digital formats

Chain of Custody

Perhaps ZorroSign’s greatest value to law enforcement is protecting the chain-of-custody.

According to a 2020 white paper issued by the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), “Maintaining the chain of custody should be considered a professional and ethical responsibility by those in charge of the evidence. It is imperative to create appropriate awareness regarding the importance and correct procedures of maintaining the chain of custody of evidence among the people dealing with such cases… it must remain in mind that it is the most critical procedure which ultimately decides the admissibility of evidence in the court of law.”

ZorroSign’s platform can place all aspects of evidence documentation—audit trail, chain of custody, documents and attachments, user authentication information, and digital signatures) on a private permissions-based blockchain to create an immutable and legally-binding record.  This ensures the highest levels of security are observed, all evidence is legally defensible, and gives LE agencies a high level of confidence in every step of the evidence documentation process.

Further, ZorroSign’s technology can easily be integrated into a law enforcement organization’s existing document management system—augmenting their ability to protect and secure all sensitive data, while delivering operational efficiencies that can lower costs and raise administrative productivity.

The Security of Blockchain Plus the Privacy of Hyperledger Fabric

Blockchains are a distributed ledger technology (DLT) using digital cryptography to secure information records (blocks) distributed across users (nodes) on peer-to-peer (P2P) networks.  They can be run publicly (open to anyone becoming a node, used for cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin) or privately (permissioned to limit who can become a node, used for business applications like Hyperledger Fabric).

ZorroSign’s platform is built entirely on a private, permissioned Hyperledger Fabric to protect identities and data—uniquely authenticating users, encrypting communications, and securing digital data immutably through that data’s lifetime.

For LE agencies that desire to securely transform paper-based workflows, ZorroSign’s digital signature and document management platform can decrease costs, reduce errors, and increase productivity. As a private blockchain, ZorroSign can ensure privacy is always maintained as only approved nodes (users) can write to ZorroSign’s blockchain.

Uniquely, ZorroSign also uses a patented 4n6 (“forensics”) token—a kind of digital seal that captures the complete audit trail and the document’s DNA. The token is digitally encrypted and contains all the details about the transaction including timestamps, user authentication, document, and attachments. As a result, ZorroSign’s architecture has even tighter privacy and security measures than other blockchains.

Committed to the Men & Women in Blue

ZorroSign strongly supports the men and women in law enforcement who put their lives on the line every day to defend our communities and protect our freedoms.  ZorroSign has partnered with the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund (NLEOMF) and committed to 10% of ZorroSign’s sales to law enforcement be donated to the Memorial Fund.

We believe our digital signatures and document management solutions to be the most private, most secure available and we are eager to prove it for law enforcement.  Contact us today to learn more!

ZorroSign’s digital signature and document management platform not only brings the privacy and security of a private, permissioned blockchain technology, but our software-as-a-service (SaaS) model can be deployed in various configurations to meet your organization’s data security requirements.

Public Cloud SaaS

Our standard deployment is on Amazon Web Services (AWS) public cloud computing network.  This configuration benefits from AWS data centers and a network architected to protect your information, identities, applications, and devices.Built with the highest standards for privacy and data security, AWS is designed to help ZorroSign deliver secure, high-performing, resilient, and efficient infrastructure for our applications.

Two big advantages of ZorroSign’s public SaaS configuration are our simple pricing model and the ability for new customers to quickly sign-up, login, and start uploading and sending documents for signatures.  Pairing superior security with user-friendly operations, ZorroSign’s public cloud configuration is our most popular deployment.

Private Cloud SaaS

In ZorroSign’s private cloud configuration, all your data and the ZorroSign application run in a private and secure cloud network dedicated to your organization.  This fully managed service is ideal for financial services institutions or any organization requiring that your data resides only in servers where you have full control.

The benefits of private cloud deployments include unlimited API usage, complete control over privacy and security measures, a system configuration much easier to manage and maintain than on-premise deployments, plus the ability to implement custom ZorroSign features and functionality.  Private cloud deployments require that customers have IT and security staff trained to manage cloud networks, but ZorroSign works closely with such customers to ensure successful and secure configurations.

Hybrid (Public/Private) Cloud SaaS

Sitting between fully-public and fully-private cloud deployments is the option for a hybrid cloud configuration.  Here, storing your data on our private, permissioned blockchain can occur on either ZorroSign data centers or in the private cloud, while the ZorroSign platform and applications run on their standard public cloud configurations.  We collaborate with your organization to configure the right mix of public self-service, scalability, and elasticity with private control and customization available with dedicated hardware.

Like a private cloud, hybrid cloud benefits include unlimited API usage and a system configuration much easier to manage and maintain than on-premise deployments.  Hybrid cloud deployments can be a strong option for financial services institutions, and ideal for healthcare organizations, law firms, legal departments, real estate firms, and other industries where data security is highly regulated.

On-Premise Configurations

Finally, for those customers who require both the ZorroSign platformand their data reside behind their own firewall or demilitarized zone (DMZ)—where a physical or logical sub network contains and exposes your organization’s external-facing services such as ZorroSign digital signatures, workflow management, and identity-as-a-service applications—we support on-premise deployments.

On-premise deployments require your organization to manage and maintain your own data centers, but gain the benefits of unlimited API calls and total control over identity access management (IAM), data privacy and security, and data integrity processes.  On-premise deployments of the ZorroSign blockchain platform can be ideal for government agencies and departments, critical infrastructure organizations, large financial institutions, and other organizations that prefer to fully manage their own IT infrastructure.

Whichever configuration your organization requires, ZorroSign has the staff, the architecture, and the deployment experience to ensure your data privacy and security needs are met.  To learn more about ZorroSign’s cloud configurations for various SaaS deployments, and how we deliver greater privacy and security for digital signatures and documents, contact us today!

It has been a long-running criticism of cryptocurrencies that the data mining required to produce coins consumes an astonishing amount of electricity.  “Bitcoin uses more electricity per transaction than any other method known to mankind,” said Microsoft founder, Bill Gates, in a live-streamed Clubhouse session with CNBC’s Andrew Ross Sorkin on February 24, 2021.  “And so it’s not a great climate thing.”

With the public blockchains used for cryptocurrencies, mining coins requires complicated mathematical processing on high-end graphic processing units (GPUs), consuming energy both for calculation processing and cooling those GPUs down under heavy load.

“Scientists from the University of Cambridge Judge Business School recently built an interactive analysis tool to calculate the real energy cost of bitcoin cryptocurrency,” notes Caroline Delbert in a recent article in Popular Mechanics.  “Using their energy use model, the researchers found that bitcoin mining uses more energy each year (130.00 terawatt-hours [TWh]) than the entire country of Argentina (125.03 TWh).”

Public Cryptocurrency Blockchains v. Private Enterprise Blockchains

An important distinction to make is that cryptocurrencies run on public blockchains—where anyone willing to mine can be an end-user (node), the process of mining is one of the highest areas of energy consumption, plus validating each new transaction across the broadly distributed network requires massive computing power.  Together, this architecture “makes Bitcoin extremely energy-hungry by design, as the currency requires a huge amount of hash calculations for its ultimate goal of processing financial transactions without intermediaries (peer-to-peer),” explained Alex de Vriews in a 2018 Joule article. “The primary fuel for each of these calculations is electricity. The Bitcoin network can be estimated to consume at least 2.55 gigawatts of electricity currently, and potentially 7.67 gigawatts in the future, making it comparable with countries such as Ireland (3.1 gigawatts) and Austria (8.2 gigawatts).”

In contrast, private blockchains that are used for business applications (apps) do not require the mining of coins—private blockchains are not used for cryptocurrencies—nor do they support wide-open end-users (nodes) where huge networks require more computing power to validate each new transaction.

“The early blockchain protocols such as Bitcoin and Ethereum used proof-of-work consensus mechanisms, which required a lot of energy-intensive ‘mining’ of cryptographic puzzles. The creators probably never imagined them to become as popular as they did, or that they would consume as much energy as whole countries,” says Si Chen, part of the Climate Accounting and Certifications, Energy Working Groups at Hyperledger.  “Enterprise Private Blockchain Platforms like Hyperledger Fabric do not run on Proof-of-Work consensus that is power hungry.”

ZorroSign Uses Private Enterprise Blockchain Hyperledger Fabric

ZorroSign has purposefully used the private, permissioned blockchain architecture of Hyperledger Fabric to build our digital platform.

Unlike Bitcoin and the cryptocurrency models for blockchain, Hyperledger Fabric is a next-generation architecture “with even lower electricity costs and attendant carbon footprints,” writes Michael Barnard in a CleanTechnica report.  “Hyperledger Fabric centralizes block creation into a single resource pool and has multiple validators in the participants. It’s also not intended as a cryptocurrency platform, although VIVA did create a cryptocurrency with it. It’s an enterprise collaboration engine, using blockchain smart contracts and an externalized payment system where that’s necessary, allowing variants of net 30 terms most blockchain smart contracts don’t support.”

A white paper comparing blockchain architectures and their energy consumption requirements, The Energy Consumption of Blockchain Technology: Beyond Myth, was published by Johannes Sedlmeir, Hans Ulrich Buhl, Gilbert Fridgen, and Robert Keller in June 2020.  Their research charted energy consumption of power-hungry public blockchain proof-of-work (PoW) coin mining (far right bar) versus the much lighter energy consumption of enterprise blockchains like Hyperledger Fabric (center bar):

 

Hyperledger Fabric’s architecture is so completely different than the mining and broadly distributed model of bitcoin that it can operate faster with far, far lower energy consumption rates.  “Hyperledger Fabric runs on Kafka consensus, capable of running on normal enterprise-grade servers that neither require any special or demanding hardware requirements or are power hungry.” (Stack Overflow)

 

Lower Energy Costs, Higher Transaction Speeds

This combination of speed and energy-efficiency makes Hyperledger Fabric the ideal architecture for ZorroSign’s blockchain platform.  A quick comparison of enterprise blockchains shows Hyperledger Fabric’s considerable advantage in transaction speed:

 

 

“ZorroSign is committed to having a positive impact on our environment,” says ZorroSign CEO and co-founder, Shamsh Hadi.  “We are proud to use Hyperledger Fabric as our blockchain architecture.  Not only does this private, permissioned approach bring greater privacy and security to our users, but the environmental costs of operating a private enterprise blockchain—like Hyperledger Fabric—is magnitudes lower than the high energy consumption required of public blockchains like Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.”

 

To learn more about ZorroSign’s blockchain architecture, our commitment to environment conservation, and how we deliver greater privacy and security for digital signatures and documents, contact us today!

Blockchain technology to protect digital transactions.

The Value of Paperless Operations

Credit unions are always exploring ways to improve their communities and better serve their members. One strategy that can do both is moving away from paper documents and storage towards digital records and paperless operations.

For credit unions themselves, paperless operations save time and costs (alleviating the need to fill out and store paper documents) plus “going green” lightens the environment toll of business. But for members, the benefits are even more dramatic:

• Gaining greater speed and convenience in financial transactions,
• Improving security against fraud and transaction errors,
• Leveraging more efficient audit trails for records and reporting, and
• Eliminating the risk of sensitive financial details found on paper in offices, drawers, even the garbage.

“If every American household viewed and paid bills online, it could reduce solid waste by more than 800,000 tons a year and save about 18.5 million trees,” notes Aspire Federal Credit Union.

Digital transactions provide higher accuracy with fewer errors, improved controls, and greater member satisfaction resulting from simplified process. In addition to cost-savings, perhaps the biggest benefit of credit unions going digital is the increase of productivity and the ability to track the progress of digital signature transactions at every step and in real time.

There are three simple and easy steps to transacting documents digitally:

1. Document Preparation: Creating and preparing the digital documents that will control the transaction, for example: Something as simple as filling out a form by hand or in digital format, or something as complex as something that needs a formal document collaboration or document preparation service such as the one offered by legal staff.
2. Document Execution: Here documents, contracts, attachments, supporting documents, etc. are signed by one or more authorized parties in a particular sequence (workflow), submitting critical information. Security provisions are enforced and meta data is associated with signatory to ensure the authenticity and validity of each step of the digital documents’ transaction.
3. Post-Execution Processes: The post-execution process includes securely storing the document, protecting it against tampering, alteration, and theft. In case of a dispute, the record must contain a detailed audit trail and chain of custody of the transaction for its legality and validity to be proven.

Leveraging such processes, paperless operations can be an effective way for credit unions to differentiate their financial services and provide greater value to their members.

The Need for Superior Digital Security

Moving to a paperless environment requires a commitment to digital security. The newspapers announce one data breach or another almost every day, and the Great Supply Chain Hack of 2020 may haunt government data systems for years: “This is looking like it’s the worst hacking case in the history of America,” says one U.S. official. “They got into everything.”

In this environment of fear and reaction, the promise of distributed ledger technologies offers an appealing new approach to digital security. For example, blockchains have quickly been embraced as a solution for improving supply-chain security for data, communications, and logistics.

Unlike any other digital signature solution, ZorroSign was built from the ground-up on Hyperledger Fabric blockchain architecture. Hyperledger Fabric blockchains are permissions-based and requires all users to authenticate themselves before making requests to read or write into the distributed ledger (i.e., the “blocks” on the “chain”) or taking any action that adds to the blocks on the distributed ledger.

As a private blockchain, ZorroSign can ensure privacy is always maintained as only approved nodes (endpoint users) can write to ZorroSign’s blockchain. This is opposed to public blockchains—like Bitcoin and Ethereum—where anyone can be an endpoint and write to the blocks.

As a result, ZorroSign’s architecture has even tighter privacy and security measures than other blockchains. The key benefits of ZorroSign’s blockchain architecture include:

• Immutability—A chronological record (with date and time stamps) of all transactions in multiple copies on the ledger are maintained to avoid any doubt or ambiguity. This chronological chain provides a robust chain of custody and audit trail capabilities. Blocks cannot be rewritten, edited, or deleted—only added to the ledge—and so ensure document immutability.
• Privacy—Permissions-based private blockchain security and privacy of the members’ information by only allowing permissioned individuals to have access to the transaction.
• Fraud Prevention—ZorroSign’s proprietary 4n6 (“forensics”) token can readily detect any document fraud, document tampering, or signature forgery as a tamper seal that runs on the blockchain.
• Lifetime Escrow—While other digital signature platforms often use third-party digital security certificates that expire every two years, ZorroSign issues its own certificates that never expire for lifetime document escrow.

As credit unions move to more and more digital transactions, ZorroSign’s digital signature and document management platform can decrease costs, reduce errors, and increase productivity. Unlike other electronic signature solutions, ZorroSign’s platform is built on a private, permissioned Hyperledger Fabric blockchain architecture to secure digital assets and deliver security certificates with robust audit trails and lifetime document escrow.

“Blockchain technology can help make credit union transactions more secure, faster and less expensive,” says Shamsh Hadi, CEO and co-founder of ZorroSign.

Learn how your credit union can tap the benefits of paperless and operations and more securely manage your members’ digital signatures and documents . . . contact ZorroSign today!

Add blockchain security for documents & workflows.

ZorroSign’s API services let you digitally sign documents, request signatures, automate your forms and data, and much more—all from your existing enterprise resource planning (ERP) software.

Development teams can readily integrate our digital signature REST APIs into any app, website, mobile app, or embedded system that can make HTTPS requests. With ZorroSign API, your organization can quickly extend and enhance your document signing processes and easily implement document security and authentication capability.

ZorroSign exposes our secure digital signature functionalities via four key APIs: User Service, Workflow Service, Subscription Service, and Token Service. We also provide notification services to handle all the alert service routines.

These APIs allow you to quickly integrate with the ZorroSign digital business platform (DBP) to

• Communicate subscription data
• Create and retrieve workflow documents
• Create custom workflows—including document processing, self-signing, labeling, etc.
• Leverage a workflow dashboard
• Generate and read 4n6 (“forensics”) tokens
• Download blockchain based certificate and audit trail

Why ZorroSign?

ZorroSign provides the ultimate security in digital signatures. Our platform was built on Hyperledger Fabric—the world’s most trusted blockchain—ensuring that all aspects of all transactions are captured on a private permissions-based blockchain with an immutable, non-reputable record.

As governments, organizations, businesses, and individuals move to paperless environments, the promise of distributed ledger technologies offers an appealing new approach to digital connections and security. “We are proud to deliver a mature blockchain solution for digital signatures that is cost-effective and more secure than any encrypted e-signature technology that relies upon public-key infrastructure for security credentials,” says ZorroSign co-founder and CEO, Shamsh Hadi. “ZorroSign’s platform efficiently leverages blockchain to protect online identities and documents such as business agreements, government files, healthcare records, and other legal evidence stored in digital formats.”

Digital signatures can speed a return on investment (ROI) by accelerating agreements, contracts, and transactions and facilitating the secure exchange of digital documents. A digital business platform (DBP) that readily complies with international privacy and security standards and regulations is critical in today’s zero-trust world across companies, organizations, partners and borders.

Low Pricing for Integration

ZorroSign’s API pricing falls into four tiers, determined by how many document sets your organization might use per year. For example, a Bronze license supports up to 500 document sets per year, while Gold and Platinum licenses support many more and our Diamond API license can be customized to the scale you require. All ZorroSign API packages include unlimited templates and workflows, unlimited fields, mobile, authentication, embedded signing & sending, personalized branding, real-time reporting, bulk send, and intelligent forms. Visit our Pricing page for details.

Learn More

We offer multiple paths to learning more about integrating ZorroSign’s platform:

1. Review our API documentation where we provide guidance and code samples for user services including multifactor authentication (MFA), user management, and passwordless login, plus subscription services, workflow services, token services, notifications, and more!
2. Request a copy of our API QuickStart Guide — a short developer manual showing you how you can integrate our REST APIs, which are more secure with light data payloads into any app, website, or embedded system using HTTPS requests.

Or contact us today to discuss how you can quickly bring ZorroSign’s secure blockchain-based digital signatures and 4n6 token into your enterprise software!

Is your organization effectively protecting its information?

Happy Data Privacy Day! Or perhaps a more appropriate greeting: Is your organization employing information privacy best practices today . . . and everyday?

Data Privacy Day focuses on raising awareness among businesses, consumers, and families on the importance of protecting the privacy of their personal information online.

At ZorroSign, our corporate mission is to leverage blockchain technology to deliver a lifetime of security and privacy for your digital signatures and documents that is easy-to-use and legally compliant. Data privacy is one of our core values as we strive to provide the most trusted and secure paperless experience.

A Short History of Data Privacy in the United States

“In recent years, information privacy has emerged as one of the central issues of our times,” notes Daniel J. Solove in a George Washington University Law School publication on information privacy laws. “Today, we have hundreds of laws pertaining to privacy: the common law torts, criminal law, evidentiary privileges, constitutional law, at least twenty federal statutes, and numerous statutes in each of the fifty states.”

Solove traces privacy protections from early American census and government records, through post mail and telegraph communications, to personal papers and information. Then “the development of the computer in 1946 revolutionized information collection. Throughout the second half of the twentieth century, the computer revolutionized the way records and data were collected, disseminated, and used,” writes Solove and “the increasing use of computers in the 1960s raised a considerable public concern about privacy.”

Congress passed the Privacy Act of 1974 to regulate the “collection and use of records by federal agencies, and affords individuals right to access and correct their personal information,” then passed the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) of 1986 which “protects wire, oral, and electronic communications while those communications are being made, are in transit, and when they are stored on computers. The Act applies to email, telephone conversations, and data stored electronically.”

The 1990’s saw the rise of the Internet which changed the game for data collection, storage, and dissemination. Initially, the U.S. passed the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) of 1998—which “prohibits unfair or deceptive acts or practices in connection with the collection, use, and/or disclosure of personal information from and about children on the Internet”—then the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) of 1999 defining personal identifying information privacy for financial institutions which expanded privacy policies across many industries.

The September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States initially brought challenges to data privacy as the USA PATRIOT Act of 2001 granted federal agencies greater power to collect personal information and expanded the investigative powers of law enforcement based on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

At this time, “the U.S. doesn’t (yet) have a federal-level general consumer data privacy law, let alone a data security law,” notes Varonis, a cybersecurity company.

But individual states are taking up the cause for data privacy and—often emulating policies and practices set by the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)—defining stronger privacy protections. For example, the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) of 2018 (and copycat laws in other states such as Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, and North Dakota) gives “consumers more control over the personal information that businesses collect about them, including: The right to know about the personal information a business collects about them and how it is used and shared; the right to delete personal information collected from them (with some exceptions); the right to opt-out of the sale of their personal information;  and the right to non-discrimination for exercising their CCPA rights.”

Information Privacy Today

2020 was not a great year for world health or for data privacy. The news was filled with stories of data breaches, and the Great Supply Chain Hack of 2020 may haunt government data systems for years—“This is looking like it’s the worst hacking case in the history of America,” says one U.S. official. “They got into everything.”

In this climate of fear and risk, ZorroSign’s CEO and co-founder, Shamsh Hadi, has built a company culture where “trust is everything.” Private businesses, government organizations, educational institutions, legal departments, real estate companies, and many other industries trust ZorroSign technologies to protect their data and secure their information privacy.

Our private, permissioned blockchain platform is compliant with dozens of international privacy and security standards, including United States eSign Act, Uniform Electronic Transactions Act (UETA), Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.1), the Federal Canadian Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA), Canadian Provincial Uniform Electronic Commerce Act (UECA), the Information Technology Act 2000 (IT Act of India), and GDPR in Europe, and many more.

Request a copy of our ZorroSign Security Brief for details on our unique blockchain architecture, document storage and protection, and platform security measures or contact us today to learn how ZorroSign’s digital business platform can protect your data privacy!

Blockchain technology can better secure supply chains and digital transactions.

December 2020 brought a flurry of news stories around the massive cyber attack on the U.S. government. Called the Solar Winds Orion Supply Chain Compromise, or the Great Supply Chain Hack, this evolving story reflects the risks even sophisticated networks—like those run by the federal government—face when dealing with attackers deploying anti-forensic techniques, user impersonation, privilege escalation and persistence, and MITRE ATT&CK® techniques.

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued an alert on December 17^th on the advanced persistent threat (APT) to government agencies, critical infrastructure entities, and private sector organizations, saying the attack began in at least March 2020 and the attacker “demonstrated sophistication and complex trade craft in these intrusions. CISA expects that removing the threat actor from compromised environments will be highly complex and challenging.”

A December 21^st NPR article says the “list of affected U.S. government entities reportedly includes the Commerce Department, the Department of Homeland Security, the Pentagon, the Treasury Department, the U.S. Postal Service and the National Institutes of Health.” Plus, the Department of Energy acknowledged its computer systems had been compromised, though not the critical National Nuclear Security Administration systems.

“Hackers exploited the way software companies distribute updates, adding malware to the legitimate package,” note NPR reporters Bill Chappell, Greg Myre, and Laurel Wamsley. “Security analysts said the malicious code gave hackers a ‘backdoor’—a foothold in their targets’ computer networks—which they then used to gain elevated credentials. Solar Winds traced the ‘supply chain’ attack to updates for its Orion network products between March and June.”

“This is looking like it’s the worst hacking case in the history of America,” says one U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity. “They got into everything.”

In this environment of fear and reaction, the promise of distributed ledger technologies offers an appealing new approach to digital security. For example, blockchains have quickly been embraced as a solution for improving supply-chain security for data, communications, and logistics.

The emerging technology of blockchain “adds layer of security to movement of critical components,” claims SAIC, an American government contractor.  “We see blockchain as a transformative technology to protect elements of supply chains.”

“Blockchain can greatly improve supply chains by enabling faster and more cost-efficient delivery of products, enhancing products’ traceability, improving coordination between partners, and aiding access to financing,” says Vishal Gaur and Abhinav Gaiha in a Harvard Business Review article. “There is considerable room to improve supply chains in terms of end-to-end traceability, speed of product delivery, coordination, and financing. Blockchain can be a powerful tool for addressing those deficiencies.”

“It’s about time we start talking about the advanced methods of privacy and security we can ensure on blockchain,” adds Shamsh Hadi, CEO and co-founder of ZorroSign, Inc. “How many times do we need hacks to happen before we finally ask the right questions?”

For governments organizations and companies that require secure digital transactions, ZorroSign’s digital signature and document management platform can decrease costs, reduce errors, and increase productivity. Unlike other electronic signature solutions, ZorroSign’s platform is built on a private, permissioned Hyperledger Fabric blockchain architecture to secure digital assets and deliver security certificates with robust audit trails and lifetime document escrow.

“Ultimately, blockchain technology helps make digital transactions more secure, faster and less expensive,” says Hadi.

Learn how blockchain can more securely manage your organization’s digital signatures and documents—contact ZorroSign today.

ZorroSign provides the ultimate security in digital signatures, built entirely on a blockchain architecture that protects identities and data—uniquely authenticating users, encrypting communications, and securing digital data immutably through its lifetime.

“We are proud to deliver a mature blockchain solution for digital signatures that is cost-effective and more secure than any encrypted e-signature technology that relies upon public-key infrastructure for security credentials,” says ZorroSign co-founder and CEO, Shamsh Hadi. “ZorroSign’s platform efficiently leverages blockchain to protect online identities and documents such as business agreements, government files, healthcare records, and other legal evidence stored in digital formats.”

For governments, companies, and individuals that desire to securely transform paper-based workflows, ZorroSign’s digital signature and document management platform can decrease costs, reduce errors, and increase productivity. Unlike other electronic signature solutions, ZorroSign’s platform is built on privately-permissioned Hyperledger Fabric to secure digital assets and deliver security certificates with robust audit trails and lifetime document escrow.

“ZorroSign’s solution is uniquely scalable and secure,” adds Arra Yerganian, strategic advisor and acting chief growth officer for ZorroSign. “Whereas other companies might struggle with the costs and complexities of blockchain architecture, ZorroSign is that rare, viable enterprise using blockchain as our core technology to meet those challenges with a fast system able to grow as our customers require.”

Blockchain’s adoption has begun to accelerate the past few years. “JPMorgan says it has used it commercially for the first time to send payments,” writes John Detrixhe, senior reporter at Quartz. “Executives at the biggest US bank by assets say those systems can grow in scale.”

We invite you to let us prove how blockchain can more securely, more cost-effectively deliver post-execution fraud detection, verification and authentication of legally binding electronic signatures, and securing digital documents.  Visit ZorroSign.com or contact us today!

“Modern digital technology that supports information sharing,

communication, collaboration, and learning are

central to daily living and to the function of government.”

~Teri Takai, Executive Director at the Center for Digital Government

Local governments in the United States such as counties, municipalities, and school districts serve the public with codified processes for business, education, health and safety, law enforcement, property development, transportation, utilities, and more. The sheer volume of legal agreements, licenses, permits, records, and reports are daunting to manage, and digital solutions are becoming more and more necessary to effectively administrate public services.

Further, local governments know the value of operating more efficiently both in cost-savings (by reducing administrative costs in paper, printing, reproduction, storage, etc.) and in resource allocation (by being able to serve more constituents with the same resources). Technology solutions that speed clerical work, reduce errors, and lower administrative costs can readily generate a return on investment for the public.

As local governments strive to move paper administration to digital environments, privacy and security become top priorities. Beyond simply digitizing forms, processes, and records, these government organizations must:

• Validate end users as constituents engage digital public services
• Authenticate digital data as it is moved between users and offices
• Secure digital documents for storage, archiving, and retrieval—ensuring immutability with non-repudiation audit trails and post-execution fraud/tamper protection

Digital Benefits for Local Governments

The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated local governments’ need to move to digital services.

“When offices were forced to close, many local governments were unable
to conduct business without physical access to legacy systems,
holding up everything from building permits to license renewals
and access to land records.”
~Doug Harvey, VMware Head of U.S. State & Local Governments & Education

As local governments add remote administration capabilities, the promise of digital transformation is tremendous. Large municipalities to the smallest administrative districts can leverage digital signature and document management software to protect the chain of custody (CoC) for documents and securely review, approve, archive, and retrieve:

• Across-agency or inter-department agreements
• Architecture and engineering drawings/schematics for construction permits
• Benefits administration programs and processes
• Certificates of occupancy
• Court decrees and orders
• Facilities management forms
• Housing programs and building permitting management
• Human resources processes (e.g., employment agreements, expense forms, payroll sign-off sheets, etc.)
• Licenses for alcohol, auctions, business, construction, farming, plumbing, restaurants, retail, valet services, etc.
• Logistics and procurement processes
• Permits for building, carnivals and fairs, exhibit and trade shows, explosives, fireworks, gas, hazardous waste, hospitals, lumber, medical facilities, nursing homes, public assemblies, waste handling, etc.
• Public health programs administration
• Purchase agreements for public assets, products, or services

ZorroSign blockchain digital signature, a secure, encrypted platform provides a means for local governments to digitize records—eliminating duplication errors, streamlining clerical work, decreasing costs and time spent, and ensuring public record immutability for legal enforceability and transparency.

We are thrilled to launch ZorroSign’s new global headquarters in Phoenix, Arizona!

The Phoenix-based team is already growing and we are starting with offices in Grand Canyon University’s Innovation Center—home to Canyon Angels; Cerberus Sentinel; the Cybersecurity Center of Excellence; Digitile; GCU’s Innovation, Development and Entrepreneurship Association (IDEA) Club; HomeKey; Journeyage; Youngblood Works, and many more innovative startups and technology companies.

And local media have been warm in welcoming ZorroSign into the Greater Phoenix economic and academic environment:

Greater Phoenix Economic Council

Arizona Commerce Authority

AZ Big Media

CoStar

FOX10 Phoenix

InBusiness Magazine

KTAR News Radio

Area Development

Phoenix Business Journal

ZorroSign Press Release

ZorroSign’s primary focus is the security and privacy of our customers’ data. We deliver such privacy and security with our digital signature and advanced digital transaction management (DTM) platform.

How?

Because unlike any other digital signature or DTM solution, ZorroSign was built from the ground-up on private permissioned blockchain, which is Hyperledger Fabric.

What is Hyperledger Fabric?

“Hyperledger Fabric is a modular blockchain framework that acts as a foundation for developing blockchain-based products, solutions, and applications using plug-and-play components that are aimed for use within private enterprises,” notes Will Kenton in Investopedia. “Because Hyperledger Fabric is private and requires permission to access, businesses can segregate information (like prices), plus transactions can be sped up because the number of nodes on the network is reduced.”

Hyperledger emerged as an open-source collaborative effort, hosted by The Linux Foundation, to advance cross-industry blockchain technologies and improve trust, transparency and accountability. Hyperledger Fabric distributed ledger technologies (DTL) are:

• The framework for the IBM Blockchain Platform
• Used by Honeywell Aerospace to create an Amazon-type marketplace for used aircraft parts
• Used by Walmart to create a food traceability system—decentralizing its food supply ecosystem to quickly find the source when an outbreak of a food-borne disease happens
• Deployed by Change Healthcare to demonstrate the feasibility of using Hyperledger Fabric to process hundreds of healthcare transactions per second
• The technology architecture upon which ZorroSign’s advanced DTM platform was built

How does Hyperledger Fabric Ensure Privacy & Security?

Hyperledger Fabric blockchains are permissions-based and requires all users to authenticate themselves before making requests to read or write into the distributed ledger (i.e., the “blocks” on the “chain”) or taking any action that adds to the blocks on the distributed ledger.

As a private blockchain, ZorroSign can ensure privacy is always maintained as only approved nodes (endpoint users) can write to ZorroSign’s blockchain. This is opposed to public blockchains—like Bitcoin and Ethereum—where anyone can be an endpoint and write to the blocks.

As a result, ZorroSign’s architecture has even tighter privacy and security measures than other blockchains.

Further, if users make a change to the information recorded in one particular block of a blockchain, they cannot rewrite that block—instead the change is stored or recorded in a new block along with the date and time of the change, permanently capturing the chronological changes to the document.

ZorroSign’s patent-pending 4n6 (“forensics”) token is a kind of digital seal that captures the complete audit trail and the document’s DNA. The token is encrypted and contains information on all the details about the transaction including time stamps, user authentication, document, and attachments. The 4n6 token securely reads the information from the secure ZorroSign servers so it can be accessed by the document originator or third parties (with permission from the originator) when requested. The 4n6 token allows ZorroSign to manage permissions as to who gets to see what level of information about the transaction and the document.

Finally, the 4n6 token stores the ZorroSign security encryption certificates, which—unlike other digital security certificates—never expire.

Benefits of Private, Permissioned Hyperledger Fabric Architecture

The key benefits of ZorroSign’s blockchain architecture and 4n6 token technology thus include:

• Immutability—A chronological record (with date and time stamps) of all transactions in multiple copies on the ledger are maintained to avoid any doubt or ambiguity. This chronological chain provides a robust chain of custody and audit trail capabilities. Blocks cannot be rewritten, edited, or deleted—only added to the ledge—and so ensure document immutability.
• Privacy—Permissions-based private blockchain security and privacy of the users’ information (i.e. PII, PHI, etc.) by only allowing permissioned individuals to have access to the transaction.
• Fraud Prevention—ZorroSign’s proprietary 4n6 token can readily detect any document fraud, document tampering, or signature forgery (as a tamper seal that runs on the blockchain).
• Lifetime Escrow—While competitors often use third-party digital security certificates that expire every two years, ZorroSign issues its own certificates that never expire for lifetime document escrow.

 
ZorroSign’s blockchain architecture, built on Hyperledger Fabric, ensures that all aspects of all transactions are recorded on a private permissions-based blockchain—creating an immutable, non-reputable record of the transaction and the executed document. And delivering unmatched privacy and security the organizations using our digital signatures and advanced DTM platform.

ZorroSign Software Architect, Ruwan Dissanayake, recently answered some questions on his career path, goals, and insights on business and technology.

At ZorroSign, Ruwan is responsible for providing technical leadership to our development team; producing architectural blueprints for development; evaluating and assessing tools, technologies, and processes for improved security and functionality; ensuring software security; troubleshooting issues in code and design; creating product specifications and design documents, and meeting aggressive schedules for product development, quality assurance, and launch.

Question: How did you get to where you are professionally?

Answer: I have a Bachelor of Science degree (with Honors) from the University of Ruhuna in Sri Lanka, and postgraduate diploma in Computer Science from the University of Colombo School of Computing. I am hard working and dedicated to software development, passionate about what technology can do for people and businesses, and believe the incredible value blockchain can bring to the global economy.

Question: What attributes do you look for when hiring developers and other technical staff?

Answer: Knowledge, skills, and the right attitude are all key in hiring developers. Their ability to stay focused is important—software development can take a toll on you as challenges and deadlines rush at you.

Question: Why did you choose to work for ZorroSign?

Answer: Before I joined ZorroSign, I worked for a few multinational companies. I was looking for a company that was doing something innovative and developing a technology which could disrupt the world in a good way with its product. ZorroSign develops technology for tomorrow and I found ZorroSign to be the right place for me. I like the friendly working environment and opportunities to create exciting solutions.

Question: What are you most passionate about regarding technology?

Answer: I like that technology is evolving and helping people live better lives and conserve our environment. Everyone is paying greater attention to the limited resources we have in the world, and how to protect them, technology can play a major role. ZorroSign’s ability to reduce paper, printing, hard copy storage, and even courier logistics makes a significant impact on our environment.

Question: Give me one word that describes you best.

Answer: Supportive. I work for my team to achieve our technical accomplishments together.

Question: What are your long-term professional goals?

Answer: To make ZorroSign the number one solution in digital transaction management, while contributing to a green technology (digital signatures on blockchain) that will help make a safer, better, brighter world for generations to follow.

Question: What area of technology do you think will have the most growth in the next five years?

Answer: There are so many technologies poised to grow, I could not pick just one! Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning are sure to continue growing, as are big data and augmented analytics. The Internet of Things (IoT) is still booming, quantum computing is stepping onto the world stage, and blockchain has a chance to become widely adopted across many industries.

Question: Business is often an adventure, what is your favorite life adventure?

Answer: I managed to escape from a few motorbike accidents over the years. When I thought it was the end, somehow I survived! During white-water rafting the vessel I was in flipped over, causing me to turn cycles in the water. I didn’t know what to do, so I held my breath and waited until my life jacket push me up to the surface, I was thankful to be alive.

 

Question: How do you spend your time outside of work?

Answer: I spend my time with my family. I love nature, specifically rain forests. In my leisure time I go on safaris and trekking.

Question: What is one thing you want everyone reading this to know about you?

Answer: My life’s journey has not always been smooth—it has had a lot of ups and downs. I kept my faith, stayed responsible, stayed accountable, and I always take ownership of all situations.

In today’s digital world, data privacy and security are critical. At ZorroSign, we are proud to put privacy and security at the heart of everything we do—including how we’ve built our digital transaction management (DTM) platform. With our private, permissioned blockchain foundation, our commitment to security and privacy meets important regulations and standards upheld by countries around the world. Here are some quick examples…

NORTH AMERICA

In the United States, there have been many laws and regulations enacted around data privacy and digital security, including:

• The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) set national standards for electronic health care transactions and codes, unique health identifiers, and security—ZorroSign DTM helps organizations meet HIPAA compliance.
• The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) of 1998 is an anti-piracy statute protecting digital rights management—ZorroSign’s digital signatures support DMCA.
• In 1999, the Uniform Electronic Transactions Act (UETA) established the legal equivalence of electronic records and signatures, with paper documents and manually-signed (wet) signatures—ZorroSign digital signatures meet UETA compliance.
• In 2000, the Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act (E-Sign Act) validated electronic records and signatures for commerce across states and countries—ZorroSign digital signatures fulfill ESIGN compliance.
• The Sarbanes–Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) set regulations for the financial practice and corporate governance of U.S. public company boards, management, and public accounting firms—ZorroSign DTM helps organizations fulfill SOX requirements.

In Canada, similar laws such as the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA) defined how organizations can collect, use or disclose personal information; and the Uniform Electronic Commerce Act of 1999 (ULCC) regulated the provision and retention of electronic information, and the communication of electronic documents. Again, ZorroSign digital signatures meet both Canadian standards for privacy and security.

EUROPE

The European Union has enacted two major regulations for data privacy and security in the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and Electronic Identification and Trust Services Regulation (eIDAS) of 2018. This elaborate set of rules and requirements are also met by ZorroSign’s digital signatures and DTM platform.

MIDDLE EAST

In the Middle East region there are two major laws that govern electronic signatures in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Saudi Arabia. ZorroSign meets the United Arab Emirates’ Federal Law No. 1 of 2006 regarding Electronic Transactions and E-Commerce granting electronic signatures legal force and effect. ZorroSign also meets the KSA laws in Saudi Arabia as governed by the Electronic Transactions Law, Royal Decree No. (M/8) 8 Rabi’ I- 1428H from 2007.

ASIA

In 2000, India passed a sweeping Information Technology Act, with further amendments in 2008, providing legal recognition for transactions performed by electronic data interchange, eCommerce, and digital signatures, plus rules for electronic records and certifying authorities. Again, ZorroSign DTM meets the security and privacy requirements of India’s IT Act.

UNMATCHED PRIVACY & SECURITY

While ZorroSign’s platform ensures compliance with these (and other) regulations around the world, we separate ourselves from our competition by going even further to protect our customers’ data and privacy. ZorroSign’s patent-pending blockchain architecture uniquely ensures:

• Immutability—maintaining a chronological record of transactions in multiple copies on a ledger to avoid doubt or ambiguity.
• Legal Enforceability—ZorroSign uses patented and legally-binding electronic signature with real digital information versus competitors who simply superimpose a flat image of a signature on a document… legally distinguishing intent to sign a document vs actually signing a document.
• Signature Attribution—signatures are protected and validated using ZorroSign’s private permissioned blockchain, plus high-level security provisions and multifactor authentication (including biometrics) to ensure signatory attribution.
• Fraud Prevention—our proprietary 4n6 token detects document fraud, document tampering and signature forgery (as a tamper seal that runs on the blockchain).
• Lifetime Escrow—while competitors often use third-party digital security certificates that expire every two years, ZorroSign issues its own certificates that never expire for lifetime document escrow.

We are proud to be the digital signature solution of choice for organizations around the world committed to privacy and security.

June 30, 2020, marks the 20^th anniversary of the U.S. Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act (ESIGN Act)—a critical piece of legislation that ensures “a signature, contract, or other record relating to such [commercial] transaction may not be denied legal effect, validity, or enforceability solely because it is in electronic form.

In 2010, both Houses of Congress passed a resolution recognizing June 30^th as National ESIGN Day.

HISTORY

The Uniform Electronic Transactions Act (UETA) of July 1999, and accompanying ESIGN Act enacted June 30, 2000, are U.S. federal laws ensuring the legal standing and validity of electronic records, signatures, and contracts.

The UETA established that electronic signatures and records should be accorded the same legal status as wet ink signature and paper records, and has been adopted by 47 U.S. states, as well as the District of Columbia and the U.S. Virgin Islands. (Illinois, New York, and Washington have not adopted the UETA, but have similar statutes validating electronic transactions). The UETA does not contain any requirement that consumers be provided with disclosures, though it does govern the attribution of electronic signatures. And UETA addresses when an electronic record has been sent and received.

The ESIGN Act, in contrast, defines essential requirements for electronic signatures and establishes a federal safety net to ensure that electronic contracts are legal for both interstate and global commerce. Together, the UETA and E-Sign Act have four major requirements for an electronic signature to be recognized as valid under U.S. law:

1. Intent to Sign— meaning signatories must intend to sign, whether documents are paper executed with wet ink or electronically executed with digital signatures.
2. Consent to Do Business Electronically – meaning the parties have consented to transact electronically, as proven by:
   1. Parties having received UETA Consumer Consent Disclosures,
   2. Parties have affirmatively agreed to use electronic records for the transaction,
   3. Parties have not withdrawn their consent.
3. Association of Signature with the Record –meaning the electronic system (or platform) used to manage the digital transaction must keep an associated digital record that tracks the process by which the signature was created, so proving that records was executed with an electronic signature.
4. Record Retention – meaning digital transactions require record keeping and retention of accurate reproductions of the documents and digital signatures that can be referenced by all parties . . . or other persons entitled to retain the records.

Finally, a key requirement of the ESIGN Act was to ensure that business and commerce between states would not be complicated by competing electronic signature statutes. As such, the June 2000 ESIGN Act established guidelines that could only be modified or limited by states in the case of adopting the UETA (or when similar procedures were provided, as with Illinois, New York, and Washington states).

BUSINESS IMPACTS

Before the ESIGN Act, many businesses struggled with how to handle online transactions. Although companies were beginning to accept electronic signatures, it was unclear how those signatures might be upheld in court. The ESIGN Act established electronic signatures as having the same legal standing as wet ink signatures, such that a contract or record of transactions would not be denied legal effect or ruled unenforceable simply because it is in electronic form.

The ESIGN Act also supported U.S. companies in global commerce, effectively promoting electronic signatures for international business transactions whenever all parties can use their preferred technologies to authenticate and secure such digital transactions. Parties to international digital transactions gained the legal means to prove the legal effect, validity, and enforceability of their electronic signatures and agreements.

THE ESIGN ACT LEGACY TODAY AT ZORROSIGN

A key element of the ESIGN Act’s enduring value is the requirement that parties retain evidence of their contractual agreements to ensure the continued legitimacy of a contract and its terms.

“Trusted electronic signature software contains security measures to ensure the legitimacy of an agreement and prevent fraud,” notes Andreas Rivera in Business.com. “For the best security, pick programs that allow for multiple forms of authentication to be used. Another common security measure is the implementation of a digital signature along with the electronic one.”

The ZorroSign platform was built ground-up on Hyperledger Fabric (a private-permissioned blockchain) for securing and storing electronic documents. ZorroSign’s Digital Transaction Management (DTM) solution leverages public-key infrastructure with AES 256-bit encryption hashing and logging each digital transaction via ZorroSign’s patent-pending 4n6 (“forensics”) token.

ZorroSign is proud to secure digital signatures and manage digital transactions as defined by the ESIGN Act, including:

• Legal enforceability: Providing digital signatures that are legally binding, tied to the actual person (signatory attribution), and immutable with court-admissible security certificates that never expire
• One Solution: Providing a unified platform for document security, electronic signatures, and digital transactions across PC and mobile endpoints
• Cost-Savings: Streamlines clerical work and approval workflows with automated contract processing
• Risk Governance: Providing non-repudiation audit trails and post-execution fraud protection for electronically signed contracts
• Innovation: Delivering a unique blockchain architecture bolstered by artificial intelligence and machine learning to speed workflows

And ZorroSign helps people and organizations Go Green—eliminating the waste of printing, faxing, scanning, and overnighting paper contracts via environmentally-conscious digital processing.

Contact us today to learn more!

ZorroSign Chief Technology Officer, Priyal Walpita, recently sat down to discuss insight into who he is and how he got to where he is today, in both business and his personal life. Priyal, true to his technology background, was calculated and thoughtful in his answers. Check out this insightful interview of how passion can be the perfect motivator to success. Read on to discover the makings of a CTO.

Question: How did you get to where you are professionally?

Answer: As the Chief Technology Officer at ZorroSign one of the core concepts that I live by in my professional life is, “do what you love.” If you have passion for what you do it will catapult you to accomplish more. When you combine passion, hard work and dedication, anything is possible. I wake up each day excited about life and the work that I do. Identifying and following my passion from a very young age helped set the path for my current accomplishments. My professional career is my life’s passion.

Question: What attributes do you look for when hiring developers and other technical staff?

Answer: First, as technical knowledge workers, I expect all my employees to be just as passionate about their respective technological area of expertise as I am about AI and ML. I can teach knowledge and skill, but I can’t teach passion. Secondly, I look for employees that are constant learners, specifically, in Information Technology. As an industry that changes rapidly employees should proactively seek knowledge in order to stay up to date with trends and advancements. When employees are providing a solution to a problem, they should know about the latest and greatest technology and/or methodology that can solve that problem. Finally, I look for out of the box, innovative intellects that are capable of effectively working as part of a technical team, as many problems we need to solve take creative and dynamic thought. Prospective employees should be smart enough to critically analyze each situation and give a quick solid solution.

Question: Why did you choose to work for ZorroSign?

Answer: ZorroSign represents the technology of tomorrow. The current COVID-19 pandemic reinforced this as the technology seamlessly filled a critical need of a remote workforce. As a technology evangelist I firmly believe we are heading into a more connected world within cyberspace; one where people have little physical interaction among each other. For example, when I was a child, we frequently sent mail through the postal service. Innovation of SMS made sending a message instant, reducing the need for physical mail and the cost of communication. Soon it will become standard for people not to sign contracts, documents and agreements with wet ink. Instead they will use a Digital Transaction Management platform such as ZorroSign. I wanted to be at the forefront of this mass advancement where technology supports a global business environment, while also creating a best in class solution that saves trees, saves time, saves money, all while being the most secure solution on the market. This is the reason why I chose to work at ZorroSign.

Question: What are you most passionate about regarding technology?

Answer: Technology drives humankind to reaching their greatest potential. If you analyze human history, technology is the constant that has driven humankind forward. From innovation of making fire on demand to innovation of artificial intelligence, technology plays a major role in our evolution.

Question: Give me one word that describes you best.

Answer: Technocrat is the word that best describes me. I emphatically advocate for using technically skilled individuals to solve the world’s biggest problems.

Question: What are your long-term professional goals?

Answer: My long-term professional goal is to contribute to humankind with technological innovation that improves the lives of all people. Ultimately, I strive to have a positive impact on society with technological innovation that encourages and supports environmental sustainability that will make the environment healthier and more comfortable for generations of children to come.

Question: What professional skill do you need to improve most?

Answer: Public speaking was always difficult for me. Recently, I have diligently sought out opportunities to improve my public speaking and teaching ability by gaining more experience. Now I can better convey my message about new technologies and trends when speaking to small and large groups of people. If anyone is interested in attending any of my speaking engagements I often post them to LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/priyalwalpita/.

Question: What business leaders do you look up to?

Answer: Mr. Shamsh Hadi, CEO of ZorroSign is my most admired and inspirational leader. I have learned a lot from Shamsh’s thought process and superior decision-making ability. Apart from Shamsh, I am intrigued by Mr. Jeff Bezos and Mr. Bill Gates as people who have made great impact on the world with technology.

Question: Business is often an adventure, what is your favorite life adventure?

Answer: To date, my biggest life adventure was in my first year of university. I went on a jungle camping trip with a few of my friends. On this trip we managed to get lost inside the jungle. We did not have access to cell phones, GPS etc., and we had to adapt to utilize basic navigational skills to find our way out of the jungle. This experience taught me the importance of working as a team and how to adapt in a crisis while still maintaining presence of mind.

 

Question: How do you spend your time outside of work?

Answer: Outside of work I enjoy spending time with my children and family. When time permits, I like to learn more about new and emerging technology.

Question: What is one thing you want everyone reading this to know about you?

Answer: I started out on the ground level. I took a grassroots approach and started with the basics. I built my educational and professional foundation out of my passion for technology, Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning. I want young professionals to look at me as an example of what is achievable with hard work, sacrifice, passion and dedication. The journey to CTO was never easy, but it was always worth it.

June 12, 2020 marks ZorroSign’s fifth anniversary. Today, we celebrate our history and our future – as well as our competitive strategy, by continuing to innovate extremely fast and ahead of our competition. We provide a complete end-to-end solution which includes many features and functionality that are missing from our competitors’ solutions. ZorroSign continues to provide a superior product, a highly secure solution, and better service. Core to ZorroSign’s vision, we continue to invest heavily in innovation.

Five years ago, ZorroSign was founded to tackle shortcomings in the eSignature industry, namely:

• Competitors were using an image of a signature super-imposed on a document instead of using the real electronic signature (digital bits).
• Competitors used third-party digital security certificates that expire every two years instead of documents that don’t expire.
• Simple signature capture process instead of using an advanced Digital Transaction Management system with workflows, templates, and business process automation.
• PDF documents that can be tampered with and electronic signatures that can be forged instead of ensuring the sanctity of electronically signed documents with high level of security.

Today, ZorroSign continues to improve the world-class Digital Business Platform customers have depended on for the last five years, providing organizations the necessary tools to transform their businesses into efficient digital powerhouses. ZorroSign, the pioneer of electronic signature technology and the developer of ZorroSign DTM, a unified platform, a complete Electronic Signature, Digital Signature and Digital Transaction Management solution.  ZorroSign’s unique patent pending Document 4n6 (forensics) technology offers post-execution fraud detection and verification and authentication of electronic and digital signatures and documents using blockchain tokenization.

ZorroSign’s long-term vision is to be the most advanced Digital Signature and Digital Transaction Management solution in the market, always putting security and privacy first. ZorroSign will continue to offer services and products that are real, mission critical, and legally acceptable in any court of law. Even after five years, one of ZorroSign’s key differentiating components, which is also the highlight of our solution, is the ZorroSign 4n6 (forensics) token technology, which ensures sanctity of electronically signed documents against fraud and tampering and signature forgery.

ZorroSign is a socially responsible company where employees and customers can make a positive impact in the world; by encouraging companies to go paperless.

As ZorroSign celebrates five years of commitment to the Electronic and Digital Signature industry, we reflect on how DTM enables us to deliver greater environmental impact by means of reducing carbon footprint, water consumption, deforestation, while delivering significant savings of time and cost of doing business. That is truly inspiring to the ZorroSign team.

The future of ZorroSign is promising and filled with innovation and growth. In the very near future customers will see, through advances in development, a new set of capabilities and functionality in the areas of Advanced Digital Transaction Management, Workflows Automation, Business Process Optimization, and advanced security and privacy. ZorroSign will continue to innovate and incorporate state of the art technology in the areas of mobile biometrics, privacy and security, use of Blockchain, Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning into our solution.

Now and into the future, ZorroSign will continue strategic, calculated and intentional rapid growth. As a solutions provider we will work tirelessly to earn and keep users trust by proving to them that their data is safe when using ZorroSign.

To our customers, investors, employees, business community and families, thank you for supporting us over the last five years! The ZorroSign journey has been fantastic till date and we look forward to an even more successful future.

Digital Transaction Management (DTM) helps to increase efficiency and productivity by simplifying paper-based processes and making them digital. The result is higher accuracy with fewer errors, improved controls, and customer satisfaction resulting from simplified process. When paper-based business transactions are converted into digital processes, we enjoy the benefits of efficiency, cost and time saving, and helping to save the environment by reducing the use of paper. Perhaps the biggest business benefit of going digital is the increase of productivity and the ability to monitor and track the progress of digital signature transactions at every step and in real time. There are three simple and easy steps to transacting a document digitally.

Document Preparation: This is the creation and preparation of digital documents that will control the transaction. In this first step, the process of preparing a document for signature could be as simple as filling out a form by hand or in digital format, or as complex as something that needs a formal document collaboration and compilation solution or document preparation service such as the one offered by paralegal staff. Once the document has been prepared, the second step in a digital document transaction is the execution of the document.

Document Execution: In the second step the documents, contracts, attachments, supporting documents, etc. are signed by one or more authorized parties in a particular sequence (workflow), filling in critical information. Security provisions are enforced and meta data is associated with signatory to ensure the authenticity and validity of each step of the digital documents’ transaction. Once a document set is completed by all parties, step three, is where the post execution process can begin.

Post Execution Processes: The post execution process includes securely storing the document, protecting it from tamper, alteration, and theft. In case of a dispute, the record must contain a detailed audit trail and chain of custody of the transaction for its legality and validity to be proven. Finally, only the authorized person should have access to and visibility into the document set. Post execution processes apply to both digital and printed versions of the documents.

Now that you understand the three steps of a digital document transaction it is important to understand why ZorroSign is the gold standard in post execution processes. ZorroSign’s patent pending 4n6 (forensics) token uses a private permissions-based blockchain to deliver verification, security, audit trail, chain of custody, along with other features. Users who access a ZorroSign’ed document through appropriate permissions can scan the 4n6 token and request access to view the documents history. With the 4n6 token, the parties in the workflow always have access to the document. Access to any external parties is limited to viewing the content of the document, its attachment, and audit trail and is based on permissions approved by the originator of the transaction.

ZorroSign CEO, Shamsh Hadi recently sat down to provide an insight into who he is and how he got to where he is today, in both business and his personal life. Shamsh didn’t hold back in this dynamic interview, allowing us a front-row seat into the makings of a technology pioneer and self-made business leader. Read on to discover the man behind the brand.

Question: You have had a very dynamic career, spanning multiple industries, how did you get to where you are professionally?

Answer: Sheer determination to succeed, passion to learn, clear and concise goal setting, and family support all contributed to my professional success.

Question: You have proven yourself as an effective leader, what attributes do you look for when hiring?

Answer: When hiring human resources, I look for six very specific attributes:

1. Leadership skills
2. Organizational skills
3. Communication skills
4. Intelligence
5. Active listening skills
6. Honesty, Ambition and a Strong Work Ethic

From experience, when a team member has these six attributes, they become a valuable member of team. If there are knowledge gaps or deficiencies, having the preceding attributes allows the team member to gain the skills on the job to continue to contribute to the company in a meaningful way.

Question: What is ZorroSign’s employee culture?

Answer: I believe we have a talented, driven, dedicated, innovative and ambitious employee culture at ZorroSign. The company work culture encourages employees to behave like a family and care about each other, their work and their family. The company strives to keep the culture strong by focusing on employee wellness, creating goals (work and personal), encouraging positivity, fostering corporate social responsibility, clear and concise communication and provides transparency from top down.

Question: What is one word that describes you the best?

Answer: Perseverant – In all aspects of my life, professional and personally, I go after what I want and am persistent until I reach the goal I have set.

Question: You have accomplished so much at a fairly young age, what are your future professional goals?

Answer: Professionally I have set out three goals for myself:

1. Identifying and fostering leadership in others
2. Building resilience
3. Learning to fail gracefully

Question: What are your three biggest accomplishments?

Answer: Wow, that is a difficult question to answer, as accomplishment often advances as one develops and refines themselves. Being recognized as a subject matter expert in the Tech Industry is something I am proud of. Saving the planet – one page at a time with ZorroSign’s Digital Signature solution gives me purpose. Being accepted to the Presidents Program (A Harvard Business School and YPO initiative) has given me a sense of accomplishment. While none of these accomplishments define me, they are each things that I worked hard to achieve and they provide me intrinsic reward.

Question: It’s often said that great CEO’s have even greater mentors. What CEOs do you look up to?

Answer: There are so many CEOs who I look up to for various reasons. A short list of some of these business leaders are: Sara Blakely, Jeff Bezos, Satya Nadella, Bob Iger, Warren Buffet, Ken Chenault, Lisa Su, and Tony Hsieh. Each CEO on this list has qualities I admire, tenacity I respect, and accomplishment I lionize.

Question: Business is often an adventure, tell me about your favorite life adventure.

Answer: I make sure every day is an adventure for me, otherwise life gets boring.

Question: What do you enjoy most outside of work?

Answer: A quiet and simple family man, outside of work I focus my time on family. They are the backbone, the support and motivation I have to get up every day and accomplish great things.

Question: What is one thing you want everyone reading this to know about you?

Answer: I am driven to ensure ZorroSign continues to be a world class company. Don’t underestimate my vision and plan for the company and the direction I am driving the organization. I love a good debate and encourage anyone, team members, customers, interested business professionals to reach out, roll up your sleeves and work towards a common goal!

Trust is considered the single most important aspect in conducting business. The same holds true with electronic document execution; all parties involved in a document/contract need to have 100% confidence that the executed document not only has been signed by all intended parties, but that the document has not been tampered with during or after its execution. There is only one solution (with patent pending technology) that provides full and complete confidence that all executed documents can be authenticated and that is ZorroSign. Incorporating the ZorroSign 4n6 (forensics) Token on all electronically transacted documents removes any doubt in trust issues. It provides the gold standard in document authentication.

What is the ZorroSign 4n6 Token?

ZorroSign’s 4n6 (forensics) Token securely displays, to authorized users, the information that is stored on a private permissions-based blockchain. In short it delivers verification, security and authenticity of every transaction and the Users that were party to it. The 4n6 Token allows authorized users to gain access to view the final, untampered version of a document, its audit trail and chain of custody. The 4n6 Token incorporates the document’s workflow, chain of custody, audit trail, the final document(s), its attachments and an undeniable confirmation that the Users party to the transaction are the true individuals. External parties to the workflow can also be given limited viewing access to the contents of the transaction in order to have full confidence.

Why is the ZorroSign 4n6 Token the gold standard in document authentication?
Simply put the ZorroSign 4n6 Token by far provides the most trusted methodology of authentication, meaning it is the most advanced document authentication solution available today. The ZorroSign 4n6 Token reader built into the ZorroSign mobile app is the only reader that can securely decrypt the information stored on 4n6 Tokens as it can only be read by authorized users. The ZorroSign 4n6 Token is the only solution that can verify, validate and authenticate both digital and printed (paper) version of electronically signed documents. The 4n6 Token does not expire and it cannot be altered, pasted or forged onto another document.

Conclusion

The ZorroSign 4n6 (forensics) Token provides complete trust and confidence for each transaction. It enables enforceability, authentication & verification, and a full audit trail of documents digitally signed using ZorroSign. Using proprietary technology, documents signed using ZorroSign are legally binding and enforceable where Electronic and Digital Signatures are allowed by law. If a document signed using ZorroSign is challenged or investigated, our 4n6 (forensics) technology can be used as evidence without repudiation in the court of law. The 4n6 Token can alert if the document has been revised, amended, revoked or cancelled, highlighting the latest version. Using the ZorroSign mobile app, a third party, like a judge can validate and authenticate documents and signatures in seconds.

To learn more, contact [email protected].

In the current COVID-19 climate small businesses are facing many new challenges. Even as some businesses slowly begin to ramp up operations, many small businesses have been forced to close their doors or abruptly navigate a remote workforce. All companies have had to adjust to the restrictions placed by the global pandemic, which has sent them in search of new tools and resources to keep their businesses functioning with limited face-to-face contact yet still executing their product offerings or services.

How ZorroSign Helps Small Businesses

To help small businesses when they need it most, ZorroSign is offering its digital signature solution free for three-months. This free license is available to all small businesses who need to execute documents.

ZorroSign electronic and digital signature solution free three-month trial delivers unlimited document sets to eSign, all while enabling users to validate and authenticate eSigned documents with ZorroSign’s patent-pending 4n6 (forensics) blockchain token tamper seal technology.

Small businesses and larger businesses share process requirements, security, and privacy concerns and ZorroSign helps all businesses meet these security and privacy concerns when executing documents.

Highlights of the ZorroSign platform for small businesses include:

1. Real (patented) Electronic Signature technology vs just an image of signature super-imposed on a document which only captures the “intent to sign.” With ZorroSign, users actually sign the document electronically.
2. Digital Security Certificates that never expire, therefore documents signed never expire.
3. Using blockchain tokenization technology, tamper-seal your documents, chain of custody and audit trail to authenticate and verify documents.
4. Workflow automation, templates, approvals, Bulk-send, document management system, and intelligent forms. ZorroSign helps to decrease cycle time when executing business critical documents.
5. Free trial offer and quick start guide can have your business up and running on ZorroSign today.
6. Sign anywhere, any time and on any device.

Why is ZorroSign Helping Small Businesses?

The COVID-19 crisis has everyone uncertain of what the future holds. Consumer confidence is very important to help build trust that businesses will continue operations. ZorroSign can be a vital component of the stabilization and resiliency of businesses, and provide customers state-of-the-art electronic signature, digital signature and Digital Transaction Management (DTM) services—services that can increase efficiency and productivity for small businesses.

What Small Businesses Use ZorroSign

ZorroSign solutions can help small business from many industries including Accounting, Early Childhood Education, Healthcare, Financial Services, Insurance, Real Estate, Home Inspection, Marketing, Photography, Event Management, Floral, Restaurants, Consultants, and Legal Services.

ZorroSign can be used for many different transaction types: benefits administration programs and processes, architecture and engineering document processing, logistics and procurement processes, facilities management forms, agent, broker, and customer agreements, closing of real estate purchase and loans, property inspection and appraisal processes, rental and lease agreements, tuition payment agreements, invoices, rental car agreements, etc.

If you have been impacted by COVID-19, let us help. Whether you have requested assistance from the Small Business Administration via the Paycheck Protection Program, COVID-19 Economic Injury Disaster Loan program or are navigating everything on your own, ZorroSign is here to help. Sign up today for your free three-month trial: www.zorrosign.com/covid19promotion/. Free trial is subject to terms and conditions and users must register no later than Tuesday, June 30, 2020 to receive three-months of free service.

As many businesses have started to adjust to the ‘new’ normal, remote working teams are surging in number. For many employees, working from home can be a struggle with added distractions and little experience prioritizing—especially if sharing a home with a spouse or children. However, it is important to understand that with the right tools, remote work teams can outperform their in-office counterparts. Remote work teams often enjoy reduced stress from not commuting to work and increased availability as a result of a more flexible schedule. This article will discuss 10 tips for increasing a remote team’s productivity.

Implement the Right Tools

For any workforce, being equipped and trained to use the right tools for the job is hugely important. Having the right tools can be the difference between a highly efficient team and a team that struggles to communicate and accomplish its goals. When choosing tools for your workforce, remember that one size doesn’t fit all and having tools that integrate well with one another can help increase efficiency. Below is a list of five tools all organizations need to secure and implement within their remote work teams in order to maximize productivity and efficiency.

1. Collaboration Platform
2. Meeting Software
3. Scheduling Software
4. Digital Signature & Digital Transaction Management Software
5. Hardware & Internet

For further details  on the five tools, please read our blog article, Five Tools for Increasing Efficiency When Working from Home.

Set SMART Goals

Goal setting is like using a maps app to get to a new destination. The maps app allows you to anticipate each turn until you reach your destination. Setting goals allows you to clearly define steps needed in order to achieve the goals. In order to develop effective goals, they should be SMART:

• Specific – state what you will accomplish using action words
• Measurable – ensure you can evaluate if the goal has been accomplished, think data
• Attainable – Is the goal within the scope of your team? If it isn’t then consider changing
• Relevant – Does the goal improve the business?
• Time-bound – set a deadline and stick to it

Setting SMART goals is a great starting point to ensuring transparency for the team and ensuring everyone is working towards common goals.

Maximize Mornings

Getting the day off to a productive start is a sure-fire way to increase the odds of an overall productive day. Setting times with team members to check-in each morning can help set the tone for the day and ensure every team member understands how they fit into the day’s goals.

If you are a team that is in relatively close geographic location, consider establishing a daily virtual check-in. This morning check-in can be a quick stand-up meeting where everyone briefly says their top three priorities for the day. Remember, setting the tone at the beginning of the day can help employees who are having trouble with productivity start their day off on a positive note.

However, maximizing mornings to set the tone for the day doesn’t mean taking away remote teams’ flexibility. Remember that working remotely also allows for you to work when you are most productive, so you should take advantage, if possible.

Encourage Dedicated Work-spaces

If you are a manager or supervisor of a remote team, you have little control of your employee’s work-spaces. However, setting guidelines and providing tips to employees about creating a workspace that is conducive to increased productivity is a great way to show you are invested in your team’s success. Here is a short list of recommendations for a dedicated workspace:

• Identify a dedicated workspace that is self-contained. If you do not have the space for a self-contained space, set-up your office in an area with as few distractions as possible.
• Make sure your workspace has as much light as possible, preferably natural light.
• Utilize multiple computer screens.
• Limit clutter in your workspace.

Having a dedicated workspace will not guarantee increased productivity. However, a dedicated workspace can be a very effective tool if you share your home with others. When you are in your dedicated workspace it signals to everyone in your space that you are working and should not be bothered unless there is an emergency. A dedicated workspace helps you set boundaries with other people in the home while you work.

Stick to a Routine

Creating a routine when working remote can be a very effective way to increase productivity. A routine allows for you to manage your time appropriately while also being intentional about scheduling time for things you want to accomplish, and not just work tactics you must accomplish. When developing a routine, here are a few things to include:

• Get dressed and prepare for your workday.
• Set office hours.
• Schedule breaks.
• Create daily goals and achieve them.
• Don’t forget to include professional and personal tasks in your routine.

Developing a schedule and sticking to it is a great way to hold yourself accountable for meeting daily goals. Sticking to a routine also makes it easier to get your day started. If you share a home with someone, a routine like making a cup of coffee before starting work can help signal to anyone in the space that you are about to start working and need to be left alone.

Stay Focused, Work on One Thing at a Time

Many people feel that they are wonderful multi-taskers, and this may be true. However, multitasking is proven to decrease productivity. Staying focused on one task at a time increases efficiency and allows your brain to stay focused on one thing, increasing the capacity you have for the task at hand. While you may be able to multitask, it is important to understand that it is proven to decrease efficiency and even accuracy. If you want to truly maximize your productivity, work on one task at a time and then move on once that task is complete.

Promote Transparency

Transparency is paramount for remote work teams. When remote work teams have full transparency all team members have the necessary data and information needed to effectively complete their work. Full transparency reduces unnecessary meetings and keeps track of all team members performance. When possible ensure all team members know where to go for pertinent information—collaboration software helps greatly.

Over-Communicate

One of the pitfalls about working with a remote work team is the inability to just pop-in on someone in the office and get an impromptu update on a project. In order to make sure all team members who have a vested interest in your projects have a clear understanding of where you are with each tactic, it is extremely important to over-communicate project status. Consider both formal and informal project updates. You may want to send an email detailing where you are with a project and what is still needed, then perhaps use a collaboration chat tool to get any necessary feedback.

The point is that over-communication will always be more effective then not communicating enough when working as a part of a remote work team.

Don’t Forget Employee Development and Training

Within a remote workforce it is easy to overlook the need for employee development and training. Often with traditional office work environments, companies will arrange for training opportunities on-site. With remote workforces it is sometimes overlooked that employees should continue to develop their skills and seek training opportunities.

Companies should either provide continuing education and training for their employees or create a system that encourages employees to continue to develop their skill set. Investing in employees through training is an excellent way to create loyalty and show the company is vested in its employees’ professional development.

Recognize Achievement

When employees work from home, feeling isolation and disconnected from the company and team can occur. These things can lead to feelings of inadequacy and feeling unappreciated. Managers and team leaders can help by recognizing the achievements of their team members—big and small.

Celebrate wins as a team and encourage all team members to join in when recognizing employees who are achieving excellence is a great way to show your team that you notice their accomplishments and appreciate their hard work. You’re never too busy to say, “Great Job!”

Conclusion

Improving the productivity of a remote work team can be difficult at first. With the proper tools it is possible to have your remote work team working even more efficiently than your in-office work team.

Looking for an easy way to gain efficiency today? Through June 30, 2020 ZorroSign is offering our digital signature solution free for three-months. Sign up today for your free trial subscription!

Today, April 22, 2020 marks the 50^th anniversary since the acknowledgement of Earth Day in 1970. Unlike previous years where you may have participated in events to clean-up your local parks/beaches, or activities focused on reduce, reuse, recycle, this year will be different with social distancing and stay-at-home orders. However, ZorroSign wants to remind you of the importance of living a paperless life and doing your part to reduce the use of paper. Check out our Environmental Savings Calculator and see what impact your organization could have on the environment by living a paperless life with ZorroSign.

Paperless Life with ZorroSign

ZorroSign is committed to having a positive impact on the environment through sustainable practices. Switching from doing business using paper to digital is not only a smart business decision but it is also good for the environment. Each time you use ZorroSign to digitally transact instead of printing, faxing, scanning, shipping documents to collect signatures, you save trees and water, reduce Carbon emission, while your business saves time and money.

Not convinced you should lead a paperless life? It is estimated that one tree produces roughly 8,000 regular sheets of copy paper. A study by the Minnesota Office of Environmental Assistance determined that the typical office consumes about 10,000 sheets of paper per worker every year. Assuming 8,000 pages per tree, a small office of 50 employees would use about 62 trees worth of paper each year. Further, it is estimated that it takes 3 gallons of water to produce a single sheet of copy paper. Using the example above, a small office of 50 employees would be responsible for using about 1.5 million gallons of water per year to produce the amount of office paper typically used.

To further the cause of Paperless Life, ZorroSign encourages all businesses to go digital, go Paperless, and save trees. Save A Tree – Plant A Tree is ZorroSign’s answer to how we can do our part to help the environment on Earth Day and everyday. For every 8,000 pages of paper you save by using ZorroSign, we plant a tree on your behalf.

Take Action

Many countries are still experiencing the impacts of the Coronavirus pandemic. In response, the official Earth Day organization has decided to go digital. If you are looking for virtual Earth Day activities, visit: https://www.earthday.org/. Studies show that by just eliminating or reducing use of paper, we can realize significant environmental benefits like conserving water, reducing Carbon emission, improving air quality, and reducing deforestation. Companies also realize large productivity gains and significant cost reduction. If you are looking to make a lasting impact and do your part to protect the world’s forests, don’t forget you can celebrate Earth Day every day with ZorroSign. Using ZorroSign Digital Signature solution and DTM, you can save trees, reduce your carbon footprint, all while saving some green. Ready to make a difference? Sign-up today and receive a free three-month trial.

Questions? Send an email to [email protected].

The ZorroSign Development Team is always hard at work developing the latest privacy, security and product enhancements that compliment ZorroSign services. New features help make everyday document signing more secure, convenient, safer, and efficient.

Below are new features that have recently been released:

Improved Workflow Builder

With feedback from our Customer Advisory Board, ZorroSign’s new workflow builder was redesigned to allow users to navigate their documents page by page instead of user by user.

 

WATCH VIDEO

Customizable Email

Customize ZorroSign automated emails and include a personalized message.
Who opens or enjoys reading generic emails? Now send personalized emails to ensure your additional comments are read immediately and get those documents approved quickly.

 

WATCH VIDEO

Password Protected Files

Have you read about all those solutions out there with security flaws? We take security seriously. Now add an additonal layer of security by adding password protection to your files sent using ZorroSign.

ZorroSign Digital Certificate

E-Signatures only capture the ‘intent to sign’ and is not equivalent to your wet signature. E-Signatures are not always upheld in court because we can’t prove the person actually signed the document. That’s why ZorroSign uses Digital Signatures with PKI which confirms the person and actually captures their ‘digital signature’. To further enhance the validity and provide a certified confirmation of each transaction, download the ZorroSign Digital Certificate.

Additional Features

• Biometric Authentication for Login
  We’ve been regularly upgrading our security features to incorporate advanced mobile biometrics. This ensures we continue to deliver the latest, most secure security protocols available while confirming it is you who is digitally signing those documents. Use biometrics to log in to ZorroSign and sign documents. ZorroSign was the first to allow Users to upgrade to the next generation of passwordless authentication, allowing ultimate user privacy and data in document security.
• vCard
  Want to help save trees like ZorroSign does? Introducing the Digital Business Card. By using a digital business card, we are able to maintain our commitment to save trees, water and decrease our carbon footprint.
• Send Back
  We all want to save time! Now Users can Send Back a document that requires edits or updates prior to the completion of the document workflow.
• Tool Resize
  Don’t we all love those forms with tiny boxes which you can’t type in? User can now resize document tool to fit the tiniest boxes.
• ZorroFill
  Make your smart forms smarter! Users can now auto fill eForms using Artificial Intelligence. ZorroFill is currently in beta testing.
• OTP
  We can’t get enough of security. Using Two-Factor Authentication, secure and safeguard your log in and documents with One Time Passwords (OTP). Users can activate OTP for log in and Approval Process.
• KBA
  Need to double check if the User behind an email address is really the person they claim to be or want additional verification when sending a document to sign? Now use ZorroSign’s premium, pay per use, Knowledge Based Authentication (KBA) service for U.S. based subscribers. Contact your Sales Rep for more details or email [email protected]. This feature allows users to utilize our KBA integration to electronically sign documents, ensuring your intended party is the one actually signing a document.
• E-Sign on the go
  Check out our regularly updated apps to quickly and securely digitally sign documents using the ZorroSign iOS and Android Mobile apps.

Visit our website to try these features and implement them in your daily work. Questions? Send an email to [email protected].

If your office becomes inaccessible for any period of time, are you prepared to ensure business continues as normal? Having a Business Continuity Plan (BCP) in place is a great start when preparing for the worst. When COVID-19 started to spread throughout the globe, many companies were not prepared to shift their workforce to a primarily work from home team.

Early on, ZorroSign executives made the decision that all employees across the globe would work from home until further notice. This decision was easy to make, as the organization had a solid BCP in place, so invocation was seamless.

Develop a Business Continuity Plan

A Business Continuity Plan (BCP) is when a company develops a plan for preventing and recovering from any potential harm to the company; knowingly or unknowingly. These could include fire, flood, natural disaster, cyber attack, criminal mischief, global pandemic, etc. The goal of the BCP is to prevent unnecessary damage to organizations assets or personnel and to ensure company assets are recovered and personnel can quickly get back to work after a disaster or crisis.

Wondering if your company is on par with companies around the globe when it comes to disaster preparedness? A recent survey conducted by AvidXchange determined that only 37% of 500 companies surveyed had the appropriate technology in place to abruptly shift employees to telecommute, also known as working from home, in the event of an emergency. This survey was eye-opening and demonstrated a large gap in BCP. Below are a few of those gaps:

• Only 61.8% of businesses have a BCP in place.
• 48% of businesses that have a BCP in place can only operate two to three weeks with their current plan.
• 19% of businesses reported none of their employees have the right company provided technology to work from home.

Based on the survey results above, it’s easy to see that most companies are not prepared for the current global pandemic. Below are some key elements that all companies should include in their BCP.

Business Continuity Plan Elements

Each company’s BCP will be different and unique to the individual business. However, there are four main elements every BCP should include, this will ensure that all business operations have a prevention and recovery plan. The four elements are:

1. Identify purpose and scope – Clearly identify and state the purpose and scope of the BCP. Include all business operations and detail any exclusions.
2. Determine responsibilities – Clearly identify who has permission to invocate BCP, along with what employees have authority before, during and after an incident. These identified employees should be given clear roles on the Business Continuity Response Team (BCRT).
   1. Documentation – identify a document owner that will be tasked with keeping track of BCP approvals and change history for company records. The document owner should be responsible for ensuring BCP procedures are reviewed and tested regularly.
   2. Change management – BCRT leaders should control the message and get employee buy-in for the BCP. The BCP document owner should publish it where it is easily accessible to all stakeholders in both digital and hard formats.
3. Develop Business Continuity Plan – Information in the plan must be understood by and accessible to everyone in the organization, and details of how and when the BCP will be invoked should be included. In order to create a thorough BCP a few items should be addressed:
   • Define potential risks to the company and conduct a business impact analysis.
   • Identify how potential risks will affect company operations.
   • Identify and implement safeguards to mitigate identified risks. Be sure to identify how to recover critical business operations.
   • Practice and test out safeguards to ensure they accomplish the desired outcome.
   • Continually review and update the BCP so it is always up to date.
4. Communicate and Train – Clearly determine how, and under which circumstances, the pre-identified BCRT will communicate with employees, stakeholders and emergency contacts. The last step is to thoroughly train the BCRT, as well as employees.

Quick List – 5 Actions to Take Today to Prepare for Tomorrow

ZorroSign takes business continuity very seriously. Having 100% of the workforce fully functional independent of location is the standard for the company’s BCP. Here are a few things we recommend any company without a robust BCP implement immediately, in order to prepare employees for an emergency that could result in an extended time away from a physical office:

• Company Issued Equipment – Issue all employees company laptop at start of employment. Desktop computers are not useful in emergency situations, as work location may abruptly change, not allowing transition of equipment that is not easily portable.
• Collaboration Software – Implement use of team collaboration software; this allows employees to effectively and efficiently communicate, before, during and after a disaster. Microsoft Teams is an example of a great tool. During a crisis where employees change their work location abruptly, having a communication collaboration tool is essential.
• Mobile Device Management (MDM) – A MDM tool is software used by IT departments that allows them to identify what company issued mobile devices are accessing, their location, remotely lock a device, and even wipe a device clean if lost or stolen. MDM capabilities are very important with an increase in remote workers, as this can protect company intellectual property, as well as physical assets. An example of an MDM tool is Microsoft Intune.
• Virtual Private Network (VPN) – Ensure all employees are using a VPN when accessing office network and resources. A VPN is the easiest way to protect company data and be cyber aware, while protecting data security.
• Employee Internet Connectivity Audit – Make sure all team members have good internet connectivity. This can be accomplished through a simple employee survey. Work to help employee’s with unreliable internet connectivity to either use a secure mobile hot spot or identify solutions for increasing their stability of a reliable internet connection.
• Cloud Hosting – Host all critical environments in the Cloud. This will allow full continuation of ongoing projects independent of employee location. Cloud hosting should include disaster recovery options.

Communication & Training

Having a BCP in place is a great start to having a business being able to function during a disaster. However, without proper communication with all stakeholders and employees, and without proper training, a company’s BCP will not be effective. It is important to communicate the plan with all employees, not just those on the Business Continuity Response Team. Training employees on what to do in the event of an emergency and when to execute the BCP is a key part of a successful plan.

A tip for maintaining a usual level of communication and efficiency when working remotely is to have team leads prepare daily task lists that include all project dependent variables and ensure they are assigned to appropriate employees. Conducting quick stand-up meetings at the start and end of each day via a collaboration software tool like Microsoft Teams can also identify employees that need a little extra help to achieve their targets. Restricting all communication to trusted tools like Microsoft O365, Outlook and Microsoft Teams can help protect the company’s intellectual property.

Conclusion

Having a Business Continuity Plan is kind of like purchasing insurance, you invest in it hoping to never have to use it. The unprecedented impact that the COVID-19 pandemic has had on the business world is reassurance that a BCP should be a part of all business’ operations plan.  Having a strong BCP in place could mean the difference between being in business once the crisis ends and continuing business operations as usual and not experiencing negative business fallout do to a disaster. It’s not too late, if your business doesn’t have a BCP in place start the process of creating one today. If you have a half-baked BCP in place, take the time and build your plan out completely. Meanwhile, the COVID-19 epidemic is impacting every part of business and society, so we encourage you to stay safe, work smart, stay home.