When people think about their estate, they usually think about their home, bank accounts, investments and personal belongings. Increasingly, however, valuable assets exist entirely in digital form. Online businesses, digital photographs, intellectual property, cryptocurrency, social media accounts, domain names and valuable online content may all form part of a person’s digital legacy.
One challenge is that access to a digital asset does not necessarily mean ownership. An account may be subject to contractual terms, passwords, security measures or the rules of the platform providing the service. Cryptocurrency can be particularly problematic if nobody knows that it exists or has the information needed to access it. Digital assets should therefore be identified and considered as part of the estate planning process.
A comprehensive estate plan should consider what digital assets exist, who should receive them, and how they can be accessed or managed after death. This does not mean putting passwords directly into a will, since wills may become public during the probate process. Instead, appropriate arrangements can be made for the secure storage and transfer of access information.
Digital assets can also have significant sentimental value. Family photographs, videos, correspondence and social media accounts may be important to loved ones even where they have little monetary value. Clear instructions can help prevent valuable or irreplaceable digital content from being lost.
Your digital life is part of your legacy. As the nature of wealth continues to change, estate planning should extend beyond physical property and traditional investments to consider the digital assets and online interests that you leave behind.
