State of Alaska eSignature (myAlaska)

myAlaska is an authentication and electronic signature system allowing citizens to interact and execute electronic signatures with multiple State of Alaska services through a single user name and password. Participation in myAlaska is voluntary and limited to individuals who meet prerequisites which vary based on the type of transaction. (For example, some transactions are only available to participants who verify their identity with a valid Alaska driver license.)

In the myAlaska system identity and profile information is under user control. As a myAlaska participant you may choose to "subscribe" to specific state agency systems. A subscription will cause myAlaska to share your profile information with that particular state agency system. However, unsubscribed state systems will have no access to your myAlaska identity or profile. For example, you may choose to subscribe to the Permanent Fund Dividend Division's online PFD application system to use myAlaska for electronic signature. You may choose not to subscribe to the Department of Transportation's Marine Highway Reservation System, which may use myAlaska to maintain user profiles. In this example, the PFD application system could use your profile to pre-fill online forms and electronically sign transactions, but the Marine Highway Reservation System would not recognize your myAlaska identity or have access to your profile.

A myAlaska electronic signature uses cryptography-based mechanisms to bind the data to be signed with the identity of the signer (myAlaska identity) and the date and time of the signing act. Due to this cryptographic binding, at any time after the signing act an independent third party can confirm non-repudiation (a person with knowledge of a particular myAlaska user name and password signed it, and no one else could have) and integrity (a change to any element of the content will be detectable via the cryptographic mechanism; i.e., the signature makes the content tamper-evident). The myAlaska system implements an electronic signature by packaging the data to be signed, the myAlaska identity of the signer, the date and time of the signing act, and the identity of the agency requesting the signature into one XML document and then digitally signing that XML document with an X.509 certificate issued to the myAlaska system.

myAlaska is currently in use for a dozen citizen-to-government and business-to-government services, has a citizen enrollment of over 250,000, and has a volume of approximately 300,000 eSignature transactions per year.