Is an electronic signature legally in writing?

Article 4 of the Electronic Signature Law stipulates that:

"A data message that can tangibly express the contents and can be retrieved at any time is regarded as a written form that meets the requirements of laws and regulations."

As long as the facts of the case can be proved, it can become evidence, which belongs to the "written form" in this article for the following reasons:

First of all, the written form should not be limited to what we usually call ordinary documentary evidence. Although mobile phone short messages are different from the recording methods and recording media of ordinary documentary evidence, they have the same function, that is, they can record all the contents and prove the true situation of the facts to be proved by their contents.

Secondly, mobile phone short messages also use the displayed and recorded contents to explain a problem of a case, which can be presented in written form for people to see and use, and it is no different from written form after being exported and printed;

Thirdly, China's "Contract Law" and "Electronic Signature Law" expand the traditional written form into electronic data form, and mobile phone short messages also belong to the generalized electronic data form. Based on this, it can be concluded that mobile phone short messages belong to substantive written form.

In judicial practice, data messages that tangibly express content and can be obtained are regarded as written form and barrier-free. Judging from the definition of data message, the written form here does not require tampering prevention, so ordinary e-mails and electronic documents are written even if they are not processed by electronic signature technology.