Importance

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Abstract

A system and method for time-stamping and signing a digital document by an authenticating party and returning the signed stamped document to the originator or his designated recipient. Messages may be received by a first 'public' machine over a network, by fax, or through input mediums such as diskettes. The clock of the first machine is synchronized with Universal Coordinated Time (UTC) and can be checked for accuracy by anyone on the network. A second 'private' machine, not connected to any network, receives the time-stamped message, applies a hashing procedure and provides a signature using a private key. The signed hashed time-stamped message is then returned. A verify procedure is made widely available to check the genuiness of a document by rehashing the document and applying a public key. The result should match the signed time-stamped message returned by the authenticating party.

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First Claim