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State of New Jersey NJLRC New Jersey Law Revision Commission FINAL REPORT relating to ELECTRONIC RECORDS AND SIGNATURES November 1998 NEW JERSEY LAW REVISION COMMISSION 153 Halsey Street, 7th Fl., Box 47016 Newark, New Jersey 07102 973-648-4575 (Fax) 648-3123 email: reviser@ web site: http://www.lawrev.state.nj.us Electronic Records and Signatures Application of old law to new technologies Over the last several decades, computer and other technologies have significantly changed the way in which our society routinely handles all kinds of transactions. New technologies continually make communications cheaper and faster, and permit ready access to large volumes of information in shorter time periods. Increasingly, private commercial transactions which formerly took place in person or with the use of traditional paper technology are being accomplished “electronically.” Government agencies have also sought to take advantage of the many ways in which computer and related technologies can save time and money, and provide better service to the public. Historically, the implementation of new technologies has raised questions concerning the application of existing legal principles to what are, or may appear to be, new situations. In recent years, the widespread use of electronic means to accomplish transactions has raised questions concerning the applicability of various statutes and other legal rules to those transactions. As a result, statutes have been enacted to recognize the use of electronic technologies in a wide variety of circumstances, e.g., to redefine the crime of theft to include unauthorized access to computers, N.J.S. 2C:20-25; to provide a civil cause of action for damage to computer systems through unauthorized access, N.J.S. 2A:38A-1; to authorize the judiciary to develop a system for electronic filing and access to court records, N.J.S. 2B:1-4. The recent explosion in use of the Internet for business and consumer