Act 7 Electronic Signatures Act 2011 16. Digitally signed document taken to be written document. (1) A message shall be as valid, enforceable and effective as if it had been written on paper if— (a) it bears in its entirety a digital signature; and (b) that digital signature is verified by the public key listed in a certificate which— (i) was issued by a licensed certification service provider; and (ii) was valid at the time the digital signature was created. (2) Nothing in this Act shall preclude any message, document or record from being considered written or in writing under any other applicable law. 17. Digitally signed document deemed to be original document. A copy of a digitally signed message shall be as valid, enforceable and effective as the original of the message unless it is evident that the signer designated an instance of the digitally signed message to be a unique original, in which case only that instance constitutes the valid, enforceable and effective message. 18. Authentication of digital signatures. A certificate issued by a licensed certification service provider shall be an acknowledgement of a digital signature verified by reference to the public key listed in the certificate, regardless of whether words of an express acknowledgement appear with the digital signature and regardless of whether the signer physically appeared before the licensed certification service provider when the digital signature was created, if that digital signature is— (a) verifiable by that certificate; and (b) was affixed when that certificate was valid. 20