Digital Legacy Planning: Your Online Life After You're Gone

A generation ago, an estate was a house, a car, and a filing cabinet. Today, much of what you own — and almost everything sentimental — is online. Photos in iCloud. Memories in Facebook. Money in Coinbase. Recurring subscriptions on a credit card no one knows the password to. Without a digital legacy plan, your family inherits a locked door.

What counts as a digital asset

• **Email accounts** (the keys to almost everything else)
• **Photo and video libraries** — iCloud, Google Photos, Dropbox
• **Social media** — Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, X
• **Financial accounts** — banks, brokerages, PayPal, Venmo
• **Cryptocurrency** — exchange accounts and self-custody wallets
• **Cloud storage** — Google Drive, OneDrive, iCloud Drive
• **Subscriptions** — streaming, software, news, gym
• **Reward programs** — airline miles, hotel points
• **Domain names, online businesses, creator accounts** — anything that earns or owns
• **Devices** — phones and laptops with biometric or PIN locks

Most adults have more digital assets than physical ones. They are almost never named in a will.

The four-step digital legacy plan

### 1. Inventory

List every account. Group by category. For each, note: what it's for, who owns it, what should happen to it (delete, memorialize, transfer, continue), and whether it has financial value.

### 2. Use a password manager

A single master password unlocks everything else. 1Password and Bitwarden both offer "emergency access" — designate a trusted contact who can request access after a waiting period. Apple iCloud Keychain has Legacy Contact. Google has Inactive Account Manager. Turn these on today.

### 3. Decide what should happen to each account

• **Email** — usually closed after important messages are forwarded
• **Photos** — downloaded and gifted to family
• **Social media** — Facebook and Instagram offer "memorialization" (the page stays as a tribute) or deletion. LinkedIn and X allow deletion only.
• **Cryptocurrency** — transferred per your will. **Self-custody wallet seeds must be stored where heirs can find them**, or the funds are gone forever.
• **Subscriptions** — canceled to stop the bleeding
• **Domains and online businesses** — transferred to a beneficiary or sold by the executor

### 4. Authorize access in writing

Most platforms' Terms of Service prohibit account sharing — even with family. Some states (under the Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act, RUFADAA) require explicit written authorization in your will or trust before an executor can access digital accounts. Without it, even a court-appointed executor can be told no.

Add language to your will like: "I authorize my executor to access, control, and dispose of my digital assets, including the contents of electronic communications, in accordance with RUFADAA."

The pieces people forget

• **2-factor authentication on a phone that gets disconnected.** When the carrier shuts off service, the codes stop arriving and the accounts lock permanently.
• **Hardware security keys** in a desk drawer that no one knows are critical.
• **Crypto seed phrases** written on paper and stored — but not labeled, so heirs don't realize what they are.
• **Recurring charges** on a card that gets canceled, leaving angry vendors and lapsed memberships months later.

Where VoiceWill fits

VoiceWill's personal vault lets you record each digital asset — what it is, where it lives, and who should receive it — in one voice-guided conversation. The vault sits beside your will, trust, and powers of attorney, and grants access only to the people you authorize, on the schedule you choose.

The goal is simple: when something happens to you, your family doesn't have to break into your digital life. You've already left the door unlocked for them.