MINSK, 24 October (BelTA) – The upper chamber of the Belarusian parliament approved amendments to the law on digital document flow and digital signatures on 24 October. Belarusian First Deputy Communications and Informatization Minister Dmitry Shedko answered several questions for the senators, BelTA has learned.
The official said that the Communications and Informatization Ministry expects the number of digital signatures in use to triple as a result of the bill. The bill introduces attribute certificates. Dmitry Shedko described personal digital signatures as an equivalent of passports. Instead of issuing an independent digital signature to describe the person's job an entry will be added to the database. The novelty is expected to greatly simplify the usage of digital signatures and encourage their broader adoption. About 480,000 digital signatures are in use. Roughly 500,000 digital operations are performed every month. “We would like this figure to at least triple,” said Dmitry Shedko.
The share of documents used in their digital form exceeds 50% in most of the government agencies connected to the interagency document flow system. A new system will be commissioned in Belarus in 2019 to handle confidential documents. Once the system is up and running, virtually no categories of documents will be processed only in their hardcopy format, noted Dmitry Shedko.
Chairman of the Education, Science, Culture, and Social Development Commission Viktor Sirenko told media that Belarusian legislation is getting updated taking into account the practice in the application of digital signatures. Once the law is amended, foreign users will be able to use digital signatures. The bill will resolve the problem of verifying the authenticity of digital documents created by foreign partners using various document protection solutions. Foreign open key certificates will be recognized in Belarus.
