The whole scenario is a collission of off-color concerns. On one hand, you have notaries and the notary establishment (yeah, I made that up) fighting to save their place in the market. Then you have lawmakers who see it, fail to understand it, and are then lobbied by the aforementioned establishment. Then you've got consumers like PG who are (rightfully) on edge about the legality and scam-factor associated with the idea. Everyone is watching this out of the corner of their eye, defaulting to the position that something is fishy.
Notarization is something business people are trained to treat with some reverence. The entire concept of a signature as an agent of identification is a bit bizzare when you think about it. Your signature is not a secret, but it remains a critical security element. Notarization is a hack. It's another layer of the same thing varnishing over the whole "signature means agreement" show. Yet it's so simple, and so engrained in our way of conducting business that any attempt to change it freaks everyone out. Fascinating.
Based on comments here, multi-factor (non-wallet) authentication is used to identify the parties. This method of ID verification is a technique that I helped pioneer at Equifax many years ago, and I've been disappointed that it hasn't ever really seemed to take off before. I occasionally see it in use here and there, but now really expect it to be recognized for its value. Not perfect for every case, but a useful tool nonetheless.
Cheers and way to go!
It is NOT legal in California.
They now appear to have modified their claims. As far as I can see, they only say online signing is legal, not online notarization.
[1] The Internet Archive has not crawled them since 2009, when the domain appears to have been used for something completely different, so I can't check to be sure exactly what they said and what has changed.
Signers can notarize from anywhere in the world, including California, since the notaries follow Virginia law. It's like how lenders and credit companies often use Utah law (but can lend elsewhere) or corporations incorporate in Delaware.
There is a reason this service is not, nor will it ever be disruptive--it does not address the core underpinnings of the notary system: verification of documents and identities. Online identify verification using inaccurate third party verification databases is not sufficient to prove identity for any purposes. Holding up a document or id card to a webcam does not allow for sufficient examination by the notary of the document or card showed to prove that the document or id card is what it is alleged to be.
Indeed, this system would actually aggravate the notarization scam problem it claims to address.
Going digital does not solve every problem. Most people at HN may not realize this, but there are a lot of situations where things cannot be done through a computer.
If you are a signer, you can go online now to signnow.com, sitting at Paul Graham's desk IN CALIFORNIA and legally notarize your document. It will be legally notarized by a Virginia Notary, and your notarization is 100% legal everywhere in the US.
"The service is not legal in any state except Virginia" just means the NOTARIES must be sitting in Virginia, again, the clients can be anywhere. Interstate commerce, and the National Association of Secretaries of State have proven support for accepting other state's notarizations.
Regarding identification, you should read the law, and try signnow's service since it does NOT rely on holding up an ID card for identity. The law requires, and signnow uses, out of wallet verification questions from a third party provider to verify identity. Anything else done is above and beyond the law, and is FAR ABOVE what currently occurs with the inconsistency of pen and paper notarizations.
"there are a lot of situations where things cannot be done through a computer"
I hope you meant a huge "yet" in front of your ridiculous blanket statement. Or were you working in the patent office last century and thought all the inventions were finished?
Something about a little post from a new company has people flagging an entrepreneur's story. This story is of interest to me as a hacker (I have a good friend in the notary business, and he wanted me to do some integration for him with the state) and I'm sure it's interesting to many other hackers. I met another guy at Microconf doing notary services online. But because you have some universal grasp of the complex and changing legal situation, and must take it upon yourself to protect consumers from actually learning about a new way to notarize documents, the entire topic should be flagged for removal. Heaven help us all if this is what Hacker News has become...
