The Court of Justice of the European Union has answered this question in the affirmative. Specifically, it ruled that qualified electronic signatures must be recognised as having the same evidential value as handwritten signatures in proceedings before national courts. The consequence of this is that the challenge procedures should be identical for both types of signature.
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The Bulgarian company V.B. Trade was subject to a corporate income tax adjustment, which also resulted in interest charges. The tax documents proving the company’s liabilities were electronically signed, but V.B. Trade challenged the validity of these signatures. The authority opposed the challenge and argued that, according to Regulation (EU) no. 910/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 July 2014 on electronic identification and trust services for electronic transactions in the internal market and repealing Directive 1999/93/EC (Regulation 910/2014), electronic signatures cannot be challenged.
The national court referred the matter to the Court of Justice of the European Union to determine whether (i) electronic signatures may not be challenged if they meet the requirements of Regulation 910/2014 and whether (ii) national courts may challenge the evidential value of qualified electronic signatures in national proceedings.
The Court held that Regulation 910/2014 prohibits courts from rejecting the legal effect of electronic signatures solely on the ground that they are electronic. At the same time, however, the Court held that the legal effect of electronic signatures, including qualified signatures, is defined by the national law, but that qualified electronic signatures must be treated as equivalent to handwritten signatures. The CJEU concluded that if the national law allows the challenge of handwritten signatures, the same possibility must be open to qualified electronic signatures.