In a ruling that brings state-court litigation practice more in line with modern-day email use, while clarifying for litigators whether settlement agreements memorialized in more informal emails are binding, a state appeals court has ruled lawyers do not need to “retype” their signature into a settlement-agreement email for it be binding.

The decision by the Appellate Division, First Department court “clarifies” for practitioners an issue that it said the state’s high court has “not opined on”: Whether in sending email with settlement terms to opposing counsel, attorneys must retype in their own name, above or below their already listed computer-prepopulated signature box, for the agreement to be binding.