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Question
In a civil action for breach of a consulting contract, the plaintiff seeks to admit an electronic Consulting Agreement stored in the defendant's cloud-based document management system. The agreement bears an electronic signature affixed by the defendant's managing partner through a signing platform that uses the partner's private key and a certificate issued by a Certification Authority. The signing partner denies having signed the document. The plaintiff offers: (i) the CA-issued digital certificate associated with the signer, (ii) a trusted time-stamp attached to the signature, (iii) server logs from the management system showing the signer logged in from his home network during the signing window, (iv) a cryptographic hash of the document created at signing and a chain of custody showing sequential edits, (v) an audit trail within the signing platform showing the contract's signing sequence and approver steps. The defense objects on authenticity. A few days after signing, the CA issues a revocation notice for the signer’s certificate due to a suspected compromise, though the signing time remains before the revocation. (a) Is the electronic Consulting Agreement admissible under A.M. No. 01-7-01-SC, Rules 3-6? (b) What must be shown to authenticate the electronic signature and to establish the document’s integrity? (c) If the certificate is revoked after signing, how should the court treat the weight and admissibility of the electronic contract, and what implications arise for the signatory’s attribution of the signature?