Remote Video Notaries Coming to Massachusetts?

In my daily update posted last night, I added some thoughts on a new bill pending in the legislature that would permit notaries public in Massachusetts to take acknowledgements by video rather than in person. This move seems to be gaining considerable attention in the media, so I decided to copy and paste what I wrote about remote video notarization into a separate post:


Also, State Senator Bruce Tarr and many co-sponsors have filed legislation that would permit a type of remote video notarization. In the 20 or so states that already allow remote video notarization, most contemplate that being done with an electronic document. The person signing has the document on a tablet or mobile phone and then activates the device's camera so the notary can see the person electronically signing the document. The video of the procedure is all archived in case questions arise, and the fully executed electronic document can then be whisked via the internet to the proper registry of deeds for electronic recording.

The Massachusetts proposal, SD. 2882, is kind of a hybrid of the traditional notarial act that takes place by signing a piece of paper with pen and ink and the remote video laws of other states. The Massachusetts law seems to require a lawyer to (snail)mail or courier a paper document to the client who would then sign it while on video camera with the lawyer watching the video feed from a distant location. Once the paper document was signed, the client would then mail or Fedex it back to the lawyer. The lawyer, once receiving it, would sign the paper document with pen and ink and then record it via electronic recording with the registry of deeds.

I've long had an interest in this area and have previously written about in-person electronic acknowledgements and also about remote video acknowledgements.

My experience has been that many lawyers who work in this field have long seen remote video acknowledgements as an existential threat to their business model and have therefore done everything possible to prevent such legislation from moving forward in Massachusetts. This bill seems precisely crafted to protect the interests of those lawyers while at the same time allowing them to continue doing business notwithstanding the extreme distancing requirements demanded by the pandemic. In other words, it's unlikely that they will try to kill this bill.

I find nothing objectionable about this bill and do hope it's enacted because by keeping people separated it will reduce the risks of infection spread. But hopefully this is more of a foot-in-the-door for remote video acknowledgments rather than the first and final move in that direction in Massachusetts.