Washington State Electronic Notary Public endorsements

[C.J. Collier]

Hello folks!

I thought I'd write you to let you know about my recent conversation with
the Washington State Department of Licensing (DoL).  In July, I submitted
my application for renewal of my Notary commission.  This year, the WA
Notary laws changed to allow notaries to request an endorsement with
renewal or initial application <https://www.dol.wa.gov/forms/659007.pdf>.
Since I have a bit of experience
<http://www.colliertech.org/state/19.34_RCW/> with non-repudiation online,
I checked the box indicating a request for Electronic Notary Public
endorsement, listed "Collier Technologies LLC / GnuPG" as my software of
choice, and sent in the extra $15.  My application was processed and my
third commission as notary was approved on August 17th.

I received in the mail a letter dated September 6th 2018, however, which
informed me that the software I indicated "does not meet the requirements
<http://apps.leg.wa.gov/wac/default.aspx?cite=308-30-130> of the enclosed
laws and rules."

The requirements indicated were:

Requirements for technologies and technology providers.
A tamper-evident technology shall comply with these rules:
(1) A technology provider shall enroll only notaries public who have been
issued an electronic records notary public endorsement pursuant to WAC
308-30-030 <http://apps.leg.wa.gov/wac/default.aspx?cite=308-30-030>.
(2) A technology provider shall take reasonable steps to ensure that a
notary public who has enrolled to use the technology has the knowledge to
use it to perform electronic notarial acts in compliance with these rules.
(3) A tamper-evident technology shall require access to the system by a
password or other secure means of authentication.
(4) A tamper-evident technology shall enable a notary public to affix the
notary's electronic signature and seal or stamp in a manner that attributes
such signature and seal or stamp to the notary.
(5) A technology provider shall provide prorated fees to align the usage
and cost of the tamper-evident technology with the term limit of the notary
public electronic records notary public endorsement.
(6) A technology provider shall suspend the use of any tamper-evident
technology for any notary public whose endorsement has been revoked,
suspended, or canceled by the state of Washington or the notary public.

This all seemed to me to be something that GnuPG is designed to do and does
quite well.  So I sent an email on Friday night to the sender of the letter
requesting specific issues that my provider did not comply with.  This
morning I received a call from the DoL, and was able to successfully argue
for GnuPG's qualification as an electronic records notary public technology
provider for the State of Washington.

In short, GnuPG can now be used to perform notarial acts
<http://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=42.45.140> in the State of
Washington!

Cheers,

C.J.
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