THEORY AND PRACTICE OF ELECTRONIC DOCUMENTS IN THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
THEORY AND PRACTICE OF ELECTRONIC DOCUMENTS IN THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
Alexander Vereitenov
3rd year student of the faculty of History and Philology Belgorod State National Research University,
Russia, Belgorod
Alexander Markov
Scientific supervisor, senior lecturer, Foreign languages department NRU BSU,
Russia, Belgorod
ABSTRACT
The article deals with the development of the concept of electronic documents in the Russian Federation, the practice of their usage and the problems associated with it. The purpose of the work is to consider the key problems of the theory and practice of electronic documents and their application in the field of management.
The following tasks are defined to achieve this goal are:
- to trace the evolution of the concept of «electronic document» in Russian legislation and identify its problems;
- to consider the characteristics of electronic documents;
- to identify problems and methods of improving work with web-documents;
- to consider solutions to controversial issues related to electronic documents;
- to consider the aspects of archival storage of electronic documents.
Keywords: electronic documents, metadata, format, web-document, archival storage of electronic documents.
The term «electronic document» came to replace the terms «machine–readable document», «machine-based document», «machine-oriented document» and «machine program» in the 1990s. Due to the need to introduce a new concept of documents at all stages of the life cycle, the concept of an «electronic document» (a document whose information is presented in electronic digital form) has appeared [1]. The emphasis in it was placed on the way of information presenting.
The modern definition of the concept of «electronic document» is documented information presented in electronic form (a form suitable for human perception using a computer, transmission over information and telecommunication networks or processing in information systems) [2].
According to this definition, electronic documents include electronic documents themselves (their life cycle proceeds only in electronic form), electronic copies of paper and other analog documents, databases in the form of complex documents (registers, cadastres), Internet documents (documentation of social networks, websites).
The usage of electronic documents in management is allowed in the Russian Federation. Regulatory legal acts are especially important, because it is the legal basis of e-government and the procedure for the use of electronic documents in interdepartmental electronic document management and interaction.
The electronic document is drawn up according to the general rules of office work and has the established requisites. State standard 6.10.4-84 «Unified documentation systems. Giving legal force to documents on a machine medium and a machine program created by computer technology. The main provisions». This standard defines the following list of mandatory details: the name of the creator organization and the ARSEO code; the location of the creator organization or postal address; the name (identification code and name of the ARSMD form); the date of manufacture; the code of the person responsible for the correctness of the manufacture, or the code of the person who approved the document (identification code, position, surname) [3].
The composition of electronic documents in the electronic document management system is determined by the head of the executive authority, who develops a list of documents with which activities can be carried out exclusively in electronic form. These lists are approved by the heads of federal executive authorities in coordination with the Federal Archival Agency. For the first time in the Russian Federation, an electronic document has been given an official legal status.
Electronic signature is information in electronic form that is attached to other information in electronic form (signed information) or otherwise related to such information and which is used to identify the person signing the information [4].
It is necessary to prepare the appropriate infrastructure in the governing bodies, resolve the issue of the legal significance of this document management and prepare or retrain personnel capable of working in new conditions in order to switch to electronic document management when federal authorities interact with each other and with the Government of the Russian Federation [5].
The legislation of the Russian Federation does not always consistently regulate the use of electronic documents in management activities with active rule-making work on the use of electronic documents and document management.
The fragmentary nature makes it difficult to widely use electronic documents in all spheres of life and it is not always possible to fully use their advantages over paper documents. The task of creating a solid regulatory and methodological basis for working with electronic documents in office work and archives remains relevant. The theory of electronic documents has not been fully developed yet, despite their active introduction into our life.
Electronic documents are a logical integrity. This is taken into account when identifying them as hypertext, tabular, multimedia documents and in the form of databases. An electronic document is characterized by the presence of metadata constantly associated with it.
Metadata is a structured or semi–structured information that allows you to create, manage and use documents at different times and in different spheres of activity [6].
A format is the structure of an electronic document that determines how it is stored, displayed on the screen or printed. Text and graphic formats are adapted for management purposes. The SED of the federal executive authority uses PDF, RTF, DOC, TIFF, allowing other formats.
Web-documents are an important source of information for various types of activities. Web-documents are documents that require network computer technologies to use. The introduction of network technologies in management increases the efficiency of interaction between authorities and the population, increases the efficiency and quality of public services.
The authenticity of such documents may be questionable, since their contents may be accidentally or intentionally changed. The reason for this is the frequent updating and «dynamism» of sites.
The required official information should be available. The population should be confident in the reliability, accuracy, relevance and completeness of the information. It is necessary to ensure its safety in view of making management decisions based on this information.
It is necessary to describe web-documents correctly to ensure the reliability, safety, completeness, accessibility, and legal force of them. It is necessary to include in the structure of documents, joining them or establishing their connections with the details by which information can be uniquely identified. I think it is necessary for scientists to focus on this.
It is necessary to study electronic messages, databases, electronic registers, web documents. It is necessary to study their characteristics more deeply.
It is only possible to replace paper documents with their electronic counterparts and include them in the nomenclature of cases, transfer them to the archive at the moment in the Russian Federation [7].
There are controversial issues about the specific composition of electronic documents, the need to introduce new accounting forms for them and other methodological issues, the solution of which requires the use of international experience and the experience of advanced archives on the informatization of their activities. ARSRIDAS employees are trying to solve these issues.
ARSRIDAS developed «Recommendations on acquisition, accounting and organization of storage of electronic archival documents in the archives of organizations» and «Recommendations on acquisition, accounting and organization of storage of electronic archival documents in state and municipal archives» for creating a unified methodological and methodological basis for the organization of work with archival electronic documents in the archives of public authorities, local self-government, state and non-state organizations, in state and municipal archives in 2013 [8].
The recommendations apply to management electronic documents that are created, processed, stored in the organization's information systems, to management electronic documents that are subject to archival storage in the organization in accordance with the procedure and deadlines for similar documents on paper, to electronic documents that are subject to storage in state or municipal archives.
The draft recommendations proposed various approaches to the organization of the transfer and storage of archival electronic documents in the archives of organizations, state and municipal archives. This is the transfer and storage of electronic documents on physically separate material carriers and the transfer of electronic documents via information and telecommunication channels with subsequent storage on the archive server.
The recommendations describe the features of storing electronic documents in the archive, ensuring their safety, organizing their accounting and use, the procedure for their transfer to state or municipal archives from the archives of organizations.
The relevant archives must have special equipment and software to carry out the necessary work: checking the reproducibility of electronic documents, conversion and migration, copying electronic documents, specially trained archivists.
We will take the structural scheme of corporate content management adopted in the concept of ECM-type systems, proposed by the Association for Information and Image Management AIIM (Association for Information and Image Management) as a basis for the life cycle of an electronic document.
The life cycle of an electronic document will consist of the following stages: entering the document into the IS; storing the document in the IS; ensuring the safety of the document in the IS; document management; document delivery; document withdrawal from the IS.
It should be noted that the life cycle of an electronic document should also include a whole list of document states, which is a very important component in understanding the management of electronic documents. The list of document states includes: planning; creation (development); coordination; approval; approval; registration; publication; access regulation; notification of changes; operational storage; performance of basic functions; archival storage of information; examination of value; destruction.
It becomes possible to define such concept as «electronic document management» based on the life cycle of an electronic document.
The main document management processes in the EDMS have been established based on the results of the implementation of these systems. The general principles and requirements are formulated for the EDMS, the scheme of classification and organization of cases is given. The requirements for the application functions of the EDMS, its information support, requirements for the use of an electronic signature, information retrieval, it’s presentation and reporting, requirements for the control of information and the organization of it’s storage in the EDMS, for the administration and management of authority in the SED, requirements for the functioning of the EDMS, role model and user training are established. The description of the composition of the fields of input forms providing identification of various groups of documents and their management is given. The functional purpose of information about documents in the EDMS is determined. You can integrate the document into the archive information system when describing the fields of input forms.
A feature of the archival storage of electronic documents is their storage in the archive in two identical copies: the main and working. The main instance is a reference that is used only to create a new working instance. The working instance is used in all other cases.
Electronic documents are converted to PDF/A-1 format when transferred to the archive. Containers of electronic documents are formed after that.
An electronic document container is a compressed folder (zip-archive) consisting of an electronic document in PDF/A-1 format, document metadata in XML format and files of disconnected electronic signatures.
Electronic signatures will be invalid and will not ensure the integrity of the document when transferring electronic documents for storage to the archive [9]. The recommendations suggest the use of hash encoding to calculate the checksum of an electronic document container.
Work is underway to convert electronic documents into new formats or migrate them to new media in the event of a change in the software and hardware environment or a system failure.
Electronic documents, taking up more and more space in the composition of modern documentary and archival funds and information systems, while ensuring the necessary quality of managerial and social communications, are gradually becoming the subject and object of research by scientists and specialists in documentation and archival science. Their regulatory regulation has not been sufficiently worked out due to the novelty of the phenomenon, which should be the reason for scientists to focus on this issue at the same time.
References:
- Khramtsovskaya N. Problems of long-term storage of documents signed with an electronic digital signature or its analogues // Office work and document management at the enterprise. - 2005. – N. 7. – p. 13-28.
- Larin M.V. Electronic documents: issues of theory and practice. – M, 2015. – p. 53-63.
- Federal Law «On Electronic Signature» dated 06.04.2011 No. 63-FZ.
- Federal Law «About information, information technologies and information protection» dated 27.07.2006 N. 149-FZ (as amended on 02.07.2021).
- Resolution of the Government «On measures to improve electronic document management in public authorities» dated 06.09.2012 N. 890 (as amended on 28.04.2021).
- State standard R ISO 15489-1-2019. National Standard of the Russian Federation. SIBID. Information and documentation. Document management. Part 1. Concepts and principles (approved by Rosstandart Order No. 101-st dated 26.03.2019).
- State standard 6.10.4-84 «Unified documentation systems. Giving legal force to documents on a machine medium and a machine program created by computer technology. The main provisions».
- «Recommendations on the acquisition, accounting and organization of storage of electronic archival documents in the archives of organizations», 2013 – M., 2013.