Web local signatures

A local signature is a digital signature performed with a private key that is available locally and therefore can be performed in a synchronous matter (as opposed to remote signatures, which must be performed asynchronously). For instance, a digital signature performed on the backend with a private key that is available on the server side would be a local signature (we call these server signatures).

We call a web local signature the special case of a local signature performed on a web page with a key that is available on the client side (i.e. a key of one of the user's certificates)

As outlined on the article web signatures, this approach to implement web signatures should be considered with care, because performing a digital signature is a complex process that requires network access to acquire revocation artifacs (Certificate Revocation Lists), which might fail on some users' computers.

Because of this, on most cases we recommend the web remote signatures approach to implement web signatures instead.

However, in cases on which files cannot be uploaded to the server under any circumstances, signing locally on the frontend can be the only option. For such cases, use the local signature extension of Web PKI. Contact us for details.