According to current legislation, digitally signed documents have to be accepted by other EU nations, but in practice the cross-border e-signatures are largely unused as documents can not be digitally signed using two different systems, the Government Office told ERR News today.

Siim Sikkut, a ICT policy adviser at the Government Office, said that the state will update Estonian digital signature software to allow Latvian and Lithuanian ID cards to be used with Estonia's system, adding that the two other Baltic nations are expected to do the same.

In the long term, the plan is to cross over to one common format for digitally signed documents and then to one platform. Estonia's goal, Sikkut said, is to draw up and agree on a road map this year, to implement those ideas.

The cooperation with Latvia and Lithuania fits with Estonia's wider goal of popularizing digital signatures in Europe.