Ask HN: What should happen to your gmail account if you die? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: What should happen to your gmail account if you die?

18 pointsjakattack15 comments

So I've been thinking about death a lot recently and I thought of a question that I don't know anything about. If you die, what happens to your gmail account? By extension, what happens to all your electronic accounts? Normal physical property is handled in probate court, which sorts out your will (if you have one) and the next of kin, etc, etc.

These days more and more of our "property" is digital, what happens to your flickr account or your blog? These could have been a big part of your life when you were alive....

A related question is: What should happen to your digital property? I'm not sure I want my gmail account to be given to anybody?

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This is something I've thought about a lot.

My mom had a disease that involved a great deal of treatment and it wasn't a very common disease so she had found a wonderful support group online. I helped her start a blog (http://www.jarrett.ws/dale) and after she lost the battle with the disease I was the one who updated her blog to share the bad news. That is still the latest post on the blog, having left it untouched since then. I make sure to renew the domain and take care of it for her.

The fact is that death and the Internet is still quite nebulous. Companies don't really address it, the law hasn't covered it, etc.

We knew mom's passwords so I didn't have wrangle control or anything, I went into her email accounts and collected any emails or mementos I wanted to keep. I unsubscribed her from mailing lists and discussion groups, generally got her digital life in order.

The idea of handling online property is something I'd even considered bringing to YC as a business concept, but I couldn't find a solid base for it. Even aside from emails, blogs, and such, I had considered the idea of virtual wealth in MMOs and such.

I actually expect Facebook to be the first social network to really begin addressing this issue, as they seem more intent on generating a map of relationships rather than building new ones.

As to answer your question, then it needs to be in your will, as a first step. You can avoid the legal wrangling by putting the info in your will as to your wishes and login/pass.

Once companies begin to accept that they're holding information and property of individuals, then they'll reach an understanding and process for handling deaths and the transfer of this information.

I hope.

I can't find the exact case... But I recall reading that a family was able to get the courts to compel Yahoo to hand over their son's account (he'd died in Iraq) -- So there seems to be some precedent. I'm sure there is a lot of other case law around on this already.

Edit: Found the reference: http://news.cnet.com/Yahoo-releases-e-mail-of-deceased-Marin... ... According to that article policies vary. e.g. AOL release accounts to next of kin.

Wondering how the family proved that the claimed Yahoo account was indeed their son's.

He probably sent mails to his family and friends from that account. So all the proof is there.

I think you should make explicit provision in your will, including instructions on how to access passwords.

Thinking about it, I would be quite tempted to leave my wife a 'to be opened in the event of my death' envelope containing (among other things) the master password to my Mac's Keychain.

I sometimes think about my family going through my personal belongings after I die, and learning a lot about who I am that they probably never knew.

I plan on leaving all my information to them (good and bad) so they can not only 'clean up' after I'm gone but also learn more about who I truly was.

/Maybe I should do that 'before' I pass.

I thought about death and information in the cloud a few times earlier. There were two problems with handing over the information to the next of kin: 1. How will the family members prove that the claimed account indeed belongs to the deceased? 2. Was the account holder OK with passing the information to his kin? When it comes to physical diaries and mail, we know that someone will have access to it after we die. I don't think same applies to digital content. Does the ruling in Yahoo's case mean that the laws in the US dictate handing over information to family members? If so, why has Yahoo not amended its privacy policy to reflect this. I think it's pretty easy for all these service providers to add an option where the account holder can nominate a heir for his information. Options should be: 1. Details of the chosen heir 2. Default legal heir 3. No one should get access to my information.

If you do decide to give it to someone, you can use a dead man switch (http://www.deadmansswitch.net/ is a good example, or write your own) that would email all your account information to someone you trust completely. You could give them instructions (destroy the account, give certain information to next of kin, etc.).

Interesting question.

There is opportunity for some one who can do data banking/insurance correctly for the masses. Since a good startup is solving a pain, and death is one of the biggest, this is a relatedly great problem to solve.

The technology obviously exists, but it's another example where legal systems and business models need to catch up.

This came up before regarding Adsense and death. In the event of a death, the next of kin has to send off a copy of the Death Certificate of the account holder to Google, and that account can be transferred. I assume this can be done for most online services.

Yahoo didn't do it, only after a court ordered them to do it. (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/04/25/yahoo_opens_inbox/)

Yahoo's policy is different from GMail's. In GMail's terms it says they will hand over the account to the next of kin if you send them the death certificate, or if you have power of attorney over that person. Yahoo won't give access under any circumstances, although that's obviously over-ridden by the court's decision.

I found out about this was thinking about social media sites and how they're affected by death recently, which I did as a BarCamp talk and wrote up here:

http://www.paulsilver.co.uk/blog/2008/10/death-and-social-me...

I think there's stuff that should be in web applications that we miss because we don't think about death, i.e. should we have an extra e-mail for the next of kin of a user? (or effective next of kin in this context.)

What is the adsense of life ?

Got me thinking, imagine you die and people send grieving emails to your family via your Gmail account. Does Google serve ads for funeral homes and related products?

I'm afraid the answer would probably be yes and it makes me sick to think of Google profiting from your passing (the funeral homes, not so much)

I remember a lot of people raised this particular point when gmail was first launch and Google responded this is the type of thing they check for to make sure they do not serve any ads. No idea how effective their checks our, but you'd think someone would have made a big stink about if they did.

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