Are wills enough? The new way to die in a digital world
Last week, I received a call from my friend, Emma, asking for some advice. It was a Sunday and, although it is always great catching up, something seemed different this time.
“Hi Connor, I just had a question for you. Grandad died this week. I’m with the family at Nana’s house; we’re trying to get into his phone so we know who to contact, but it has a passcode on it. Would you know how we can get past it?”
Well, naturally I asked around. I have a friend in IT who is quite ‘tech savvy’, and he outlined their two options: 1) Emma could log into his Google account to unlock the phone that way, or 2) try to guess the passcode, but carefully, as too many wrong answers will lock the phone permanently.
“But we don’t know any of his passwords, we don’t even know if he has a ‘Google account’, and we clearly don’t know the passcode!”
Well, the internet has changed our lives significantly over the past 20 years and we have all needed to adapt to this new way of life. When passwords started seeing use on PCs and Nokia 3310s, I heard stories of people writing their password across two pieces of paper, then giving these to family members under the stipulation of ‘Only when I die, bring these together so you can still log into my PC ’. Now we have passwords for everything, and we are told we should have a different password for each online account or, at the very least, to have a handful of different codes to remember.
We are now seeing more and more cases similar to that of Emma and her family, where the lack of access to passwords can make dealing with the death of a loved one so much more onerous than it needs to be. If her grandad had written his phone’s passcode down securely, in a way that can only be accessed on death, then this would have saved a lot of time and stress for the family.
So, how could this difficult situation have been prevented?
1. Keep a physical list of your passwords
This is the least secure method and is not really recommended, but it would perhaps be better than nothing. If you choose this option, then make sure you keep the list somewhere secure, such as in a safe or a locked drawer at home, and make sure at least one person knows where to find it. Of course, you run the risk of that person knowing your passwords before you die, or of the list being misplaced or seen by someone else, which could compromise all of your accounts in one go. Be very careful to maintain the physical security of this list and who you inform that it exists if you choose this option.
2. Mention your passwords and account details in your Will
This is a much more secure method and is, perhaps, the most appealing to us all. Most do not realise you can list your regularly used passwords in your Will alongside your instructions for your estate, which is incredibly useful for the executor to have to hand. If you haven’t reviewed or updated your Will in a while, this could be a good reason to do so. However, the downside here is that whilst amending your passwords is easy, updating your Will takes a lot more effort. If you need to change your passwords in the future, then remember to update your Will at the same time, or the exercise is useless.
3. Use a password manager
Remembering passwords is difficult, so it is no wonder why we tend to use the same 2 or 3 passwords for everything we have. However, this means that if 1 or 2 of your passwords get hacked or stolen, then ALL of your online accounts could be infiltrated at once. A password manager is effectively an encrypted ‘vault’ which creates and stores very secure and unique passwords on your behalf. It will auto-fill login details for your websites and phone apps, and it has advanced security features which allow you to only remember a single ‘master password’ for getting into the vault.
Why is this important? These services often have a feature in place to help pass on your ‘master password’ if you die. For example, mine told me to email a link to my executors for them to click when I die. When that link is clicked, the password manager sends me an email and, if I do not respond within 72 hours, then all my passwords, online accounts and my phone PIN are shared securely with my executor. If my executor tries to access my vault of passwords early, then I can just cancel the request within that 72 hour period… and re-think who I can trust in dealing with my estate!
Emma and her family managed to guess their Grandad’s phone code in the end. It took an afternoon of careful guessing between the 8 of them. Their guesses became more obscure as the day went on and, eventually, they found it – six numbers taken from his old landline number. All his friends were notified and some even made it to the funeral. The family got very lucky; a few more guesses and these contacts would have been lost and never told.
Next up is figuring out Grandad’s email password…
This article was prepared by Connor Read, a paraplanner at CAM. We always appreciate your feedback. If you have enjoyed this article or have any specific topics you would like to see addressed in future newsletters, please email us at FPTeam@city-asset.co.uk.