On Scanning Your Signature

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Several people have commented that scanning your signature is a bad idea because if someone got a hold of the file they could sign away everything you own.  Obviously you should keep the file private. I wouldn’t recommend attaching it to each of your emails or putting it on a web page or anything like that, but it is probably no more risky than anything else you do on a regular basis.

Consider the following:

1. If you ever write a check or sign a credit card receipt at a store, you are essentially handing a stranger a copy of your signature already.  They could easily digitize it using the process I’ve just shown and use to sign things as you.
2. Most of the time when you sign something, does anyone verify that it is indeed your signature?  Most stores don’t even verify that your signature matches the back of a credit card.  Someone could just as easily sign something as you using their own handwriting and it would probably slip through just fine.  If you apply for a credit card, they aren’t verifying your signature against anything.  If someone wants to get a credit card in your name, they aren’t going to need your signature to do it.
3. Anything important is going to require more than just a signature.  If you buy a house or something like that, they are going to require a notarized signature.  That means that someone verified you are who you say before sign the document.

I’m not saying that someone getting your signature couldn’t prove to be inconvenient, but I can’t think of much someone could do that they couldn’t do already.  Especially because most people’s signatures are widely distributed already and it wouldn’t take much effort to get a copy.