Signature word is not unknown to us. But we are not well aware about the details of Digital Signature. We insert our signature as a specimen for our identity. So that it cannot be forged by others. But the same is not possible in the digital world since the paper access is not provided to you for signatures. For the very same purpose we rely on digital signatures.

Digital Signature serves various purposes. It discloses the IP address from which your signature has been uploaded and specifies the particular file has come for which computer. Since the signature is encrypted it specifies the document for which it has been attached and auto checks if there has been any modification in the middle before receiving the digital signature. Your digital signature avails the facility of check sum through which you can check the authentication of the digital signature. For supposition when we hack a website and steal a file, and amend the information before sending it to the other then the file cannot be verified if its original or not or if any changes have been made. But in case of digital signature if there is any kind of amendment in the original file then through check sum one can verify if there has been any kind of modification in the file as a result your signature cannot be hacked and unethically used by hackers.

Apart from the above feature the digital signature comprises of two other specifications that is public key encryption and private key encryption. Suppose person 1 has a file which needs to be sent to person 2 in this case private key encryption comes in use. In this process when person 1 sends the file he shares the password of the file with person 2 so in case if person 3 gets the same file it will be of no use to him since he will not have the password for the file. Whereas for person 2 he will easily decode the file sent by person 1 and use it as per the requirement.

Now coming to public key. My computer will act as a public key as well as a private key since the files open for view to all will be easily accessible for anybody but in case I lock my file for my personal use that will work as a private key. In public key encryption my private file can be encrypted to receivers public file. In this way the receiver will know who has sent the file and he will be able to decode the file easily and risk of theft will be curtailed. Certificate authority authenticates the digital signature software. A duplicate for digital signature cannot be obtained so security of digital signature is very important so you should never handover your digital signature to any random person. As this signature of yours holds as an identity for you similar as debit card and your aadhar card.