Content Warning: Death, Bereavement

1. Follow the process
2. Complete the template

When I die, or become significantly incapacitated, my wife will take control of my assets and responsibilities. She will become solely accountable for paying the bills and managing the household. All those little things I do every day to keep things going, from paying the credit card to taxing the car, will fall on her to arrange.

Death is a part of life, and as such processes have been created to deal with with the inevitable. Governments, banks, utility companies, and the legal system have created ways for our trustees and loved ones to manage our estate. The majority of those dying today in the western world will be of a generation who manage their affairs on paper - bills, statements, and letters pointing to the organisations that need to be contacted.

But what about my digital estate?

Locked down, encrypted, and secured through PDFs, portals, and emails.

A password known only to me.

Everything is digital, there is no paper trail.

However, it's actually worse than you imagine. If I die then my wife's online life may also die. Our email addresses are tied into my domain name, paid for by me through my credit card. While it won't happen immediately there will come a time when an action will need to be taken that if not performed will lock her out of her digital life.

How can I ensure that, in the event of my demise, my wife can unlock our digital life and my digital legacy?

I came up with the idea of creating a Digital Estate Emergency Kit to allow those who follow to close down or continue to manage my digital life.

The kit currently consists of a template that you can fill out and modify for your own specific needs. I have tried to cover everything I thought would be relevant for a competent person to make a good start at managing my digital life.

• Template - Digital Estate Emergency Kit
• Process you can follow to create your kit
• Password Managers - How to grant access to a trusted third party
• Resources related to emergency kits and digital estate management
• Things to consider

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