# Digital Signatures {% embed url="" %} ### Introduction Overall, there are three foundational concepts that, if understood well, can make the initial learning journey for Bitcoin SV much easier. While the two other concepts are Hash Functions and [Merkle Trees](https://bitcoinsv.academy/course/bitcoin-primitives-merkle-trees), the focus of this course is to cover the third concept - Digital Signatures. As this is a beginner-level course, it assumes no knowledge of Bitcoin SV. There are many well-proven Digital Signature Schemes such as RSA (based upon the name of its inventors Rivest-Shamir-Addlemen), Digital Standard Signature, ECDSA (Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm), used by enterprise products. For the scope of this course, our focus will only be on ECDSA as used in Bitcoin SV. In order to build a solid conceptual understanding, the course will progress in the following order:\ \ Chapter 1 - What are Digital Signatures?\ Chapter 2 - ECDSA Pre-requisites\ Chapter 3 - ECDSA\ Chapter 4 - Bitcoin and Digital Signatures\ \ Upon completion of this course, students will be awarded our certificate of completion. Should you have any questions as you go through the course, please join our [Discord channel](https://discord.gg/3y3nY96AsV).\ \ Please use our [contact form](http://bitcoinsv.academy/contact) if you want to report any issues or have any comments about the course. --- # Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question. Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter: ``` GET https://hub.bsvblockchain.org/bsv-skills-center/~/changes/149/bsv-academy/digital-signatures.md?ask= ``` The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language. The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation. Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.