Natural Variations in signature on Various surfaces

Abstract

A signature is a handwritten depiction of someone's name, nickname, or even a simple “X” that an individual writes on document as a proof of identity. Signature is an evidence considered as chief part of information in forensic investigation. Signatures are highly individualized and habitual. It is commonly encountered in case like property, murder, suicides, kidnapping etc. The word sign is defined under section 3 (56) of General clauses act 1897 says: “Sign”, with reference to a person who is unable to write his name include “marks”. Natural variation in signature is a problem for signature verifier as it requires to judge whether the variation is the natural difference occurring between different instances of a signature or the variation is significant enough to reject the instances as being an attempted forgery. A genuine signature is the personal mark of an individual. It indicates his or her acceptance of some set of circumstances, or to be the symbol associated with such an agreement. Characteristic of handwriting and signature are similar. The present study is based on the forensic analysis of signature on different surfaces to analyse the natural variation. Signature of a person on various surfaces depends on showing that their degree of variability by some measures likes slant, loop, angle, baseline and strokes etc. In the present study an attempt is made to provide an effective method of study of variation in signatures of same writer written on different surfaces.