# Evidence agreement for Contraktia electronic signatures

Identifier: contraktia-evidence-agreement
Version: 3 of 27 September 2026 (draft to be reviewed by a lawyer)
Applicable signature and evidence policy: contraktia-sig-policy-v3

## Article 1 — Purpose and parties

1.1 Pursuant to Article 1368 of the French Civil Code, this agreement sets out the rules of evidence applicable to documents signed electronically on the Contraktia platform (the "Document"). The Document may be drafted on the platform or, where applicable, be a PDF file supplied by the Issuing Organisation and signed as is.

1.2 It binds every person who signs the Document on the platform, in their own name or on behalf of the person they represent (the "Signatory"), and the organisation that issued the Document on the platform (the "Issuing Organisation"); together, the "Parties". Each Signatory accepts it by ticking, before signing, the box provided for that purpose on the signing page. The Issuing Organisation accepts it by submitting the Document for signature on the platform.

1.3 This agreement does not change the content of the Document. It only governs how the signature, the integrity of the Document and the circumstances of its signature are established. The Issuing Organisation alone is responsible for the content of a Document it supplies: the platform does not check its content.

## Article 2 — Signature process

2.1 The process is a simple electronic signature within the meaning of Article 3 of Regulation (EU) No 910/2014 ("eIDAS") and Article 1367 of the French Civil Code. It is described by the signature and evidence policy identified as "contraktia-sig-policy-v3", published by Contraktia, whose fingerprint appears in every evidence file.

2.2 In short, for each Signatory:
- the Document is frozen before signature and identified by its SHA-256 fingerprint; when it is a PDF file supplied by the Issuing Organisation, that file, identified by the SHA-256 fingerprint of its exact bytes, is signed as is;
- the Signatory reads the Document and ticks a consent box that is not pre-ticked;
- when ready to sign, the Signatory requests their signing code, a one-time code separate from any access code, which they must enter: it is sent by SMS to the mobile number designated by the Issuing Organisation when the latter has enabled sending by SMS for that signature, and otherwise to their email address; the Signatory cannot change that number;
- when the SMS is not received and the Issuing Organisation has not required the SMS, the Signatory may, after a few minutes, receive their signing code at their email address instead; this fallback is recorded in the evidence;
- the Signatory confirms the signature with a separate action;
- once all signatures have been collected, the platform produces the final copy, an evidence file and a sealing manifest signed with its sealing key.

2.3 The Parties acknowledge that they have been informed that this process is neither an advanced nor a qualified electronic signature, including when a code is sent by SMS, and therefore does not benefit from the presumption of reliability provided for by Article 1367 of the French Civil Code and Decree No 2017-1416 of 28 September 2017. The signing code received by SMS establishes possession, at the time of signature, of the phone line designated by the Issuing Organisation; received by email, it establishes control of the email address used. These codes do not by themselves establish the civil identity of the Signatory or the extent of their powers of representation.

## Article 3 — Evidence

The Parties agree that the following items, produced or kept by the platform, are admissible as evidence between them:
- the frozen Document and its SHA-256 fingerprint and, where applicable, the PDF file supplied and signed as is, with its fingerprint;
- the final signed copy (PDF), which includes the signature certificate;
- for each Signatory: the declared identity, the email address, the exact text of the ticked boxes, the acceptance of this agreement (version, language and fingerprint), the dates and times of consent, of sending and verifying the signing code (and the channel used: SMS or email, with any fallback from SMS to email) and of confirmation, the IP address and browser used and, where applicable, the mandate relied upon;
- where applicable, for the code sent by SMS: the mobile number in masked form and as a salted cryptographic commitment, the date on which the Issuing Organisation designated it, the dates and times of sending and verifying the code and the message identifier at the sending provider; in the event of a dispute, the Issuing Organisation may disclose the full number and the salt, which allow anyone to recompute that commitment;
- the audit log chained by fingerprints and the events it contains;
- the evidence file (proof.json file and evidence report) and the signed sealing manifest;
- where applicable, the timestamp tokens issued by a third-party time-stamping authority and the external anchoring records of the audit log.

## Article 4 — Probative value

4.1 The Parties acknowledge that a signature applied through this process expresses the Signatory's consent to the obligations arising from the Document and identifies the Signatory within the limits stated in Article 2.3.

4.2 The items listed in Article 3 are authoritative between the Parties, unless proven otherwise, as to their content, date and origin. They are admissible in the same way as a written document on paper (Articles 1366 and 1367 of the French Civil Code). No Party may challenge their admissibility solely on the ground that they are in electronic form.

4.3 The recorded dates and times are those of the platform's servers, expressed in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). Where a timestamp token issued by a third-party time-stamping authority covers an item, the date it certifies prevails for that item.

4.4 Nothing in this agreement deprives a Party, in particular a consumer or a non-professional, of the right to prove the contrary by any means, or places on that Party a burden of proof that would not fall on it under the applicable law.

## Article 5 — Integrity and verification

5.1 Any change to the final copy or to the evidence file, however small, changes its fingerprint and invalidates the seal.

5.2 Each Party may check, without relying on the platform, the integrity of the final copy and of the evidence file, using the independent verifier and the instructions included in the evidence file and the public sealing keys published by Contraktia. The public verification page also makes it possible to check a signed copy.

## Article 6 — Retention, access and personal data

6.1 The final copy and its evidence report are sent to each Signatory by email after sealing. Each Party is invited to keep them; its own copies have the same value as those kept by the platform, as long as their fingerprint matches the one in the sealing manifest.

6.2 The platform keeps, encrypted, the final copy, the evidence file and the audit log with the contract archive of the Issuing Organisation, in accordance with the signature and evidence policy and the privacy policy. The complete evidence file can be downloaded by authenticated Signatories and obtained from the Issuing Organisation.

6.3 Where applicable, the Signatory's mobile number is provided by the Issuing Organisation, which is responsible for it; it is only used to send the code by SMS, entrusted to the sending provider designated in Contraktia's privacy policy, and it is kept with the signature request. The text of the SMS contains no data of the Document.

## Article 7 — Versions, languages and governing law

7.1 This agreement exists in French and in English. Each language version is identified by its SHA-256 fingerprint. Each Signatory is bound by the version they accepted, whose number, language and fingerprint are recorded in the evidence file.

7.2 A new version only applies to signatures collected after its publication; it never changes an evidence file that has already been issued.

7.3 This agreement is governed by French law, without prejudice to the law applicable to the Document itself.