In the following example, there's an implied addtional party, viz the
person or entity which had the checks printed up, To emulate this
situation electronically, I think it's necessary to bring that party into
the picture explicitly. This leads to something like:
A says that whatever is in the following message can be believed if it's
signed by one of {B,C,D,E,F}, i.e. authorized signers, if the amount
involved is less than $1,000, but two of them are required to sign if the
amount is over $1,000. In addition to interpreting the semantics of A's
statement, the receiver must also know who A is and trust his statement.
This is a fairly complex situation. Having pre-printed checks with this
sort of rule printed on it makes sense in a paper world, but doesn't fall
out naturally in an electronic world without a lot of additional
infrastructure.
At 5:52 PM 12/29/94, Steve Kent wrote:
Rhys,
In contrast to your example, I often encounter checks that
explicitly state that if the value of the check is greater than some
stated amount, then two signatures must be present. Since there is no
universal convention about what values trigger the requirement for an
additional signature, a bank would not refuse to honor a check with
only one signature where two are required by the check issuer, unless
the issuer makes this requirement explicit.
Steve
--------------------
Steve Crocker
CyberCash, Inc. Work: +1 703 620 1222
2086 Hunters Crest Way Fax: +1 703 391 2651
Vienna, VA 22181
crocker(_at_)cybercash(_dot_)com