By Harry Prabandham · Updated September 28, 2026
Estate & Legacy
Digital Estate Planning: Accounts, Passwords, and Crypto
Digital estate planning inventories your online accounts and digital assets and gives a fiduciary legal authority and access after death or incapacity.
Digital Estate Planning: Accounts, Passwords, and Crypto
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What is digital estate planning?
- It is making sure the right people can find, access, and manage your online accounts and digital assets if you die or become incapacitated.
- It covers financial logins, email, cloud files and photos, domain names, online businesses, and cryptocurrency.
- It has two parts: legal authority for your fiduciary, and practical access such as passwords and recovery keys.
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Full Guide
What is digital estate planning?
- It is making sure the right people can find, access, and manage your online accounts and digital assets if you die or become incapacitated.
- It covers financial logins, email, cloud files and photos, domain names, online businesses, and cryptocurrency.
- It has two parts: legal authority for your fiduciary, and practical access such as passwords and recovery keys.
Who can legally access accounts after death?
- Most states, including California, have adopted the Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act.
- Under California's version, instructions you give through a provider's online tool come first, then your will, trust, or power of attorney, then the provider's terms of service.
- Without express consent, a fiduciary may get a list of your communications but not their content.
- Estate documents can include a clause authorizing access to digital assets and electronic communications.
How do you build a digital asset inventory?
- List each account by type: financial, email, cloud storage, social media, subscriptions, and business accounts.
- Note how two-factor authentication works for each, since a code sent to your phone can lock out an executor.
- Record where valuable items live, such as crypto wallets, domain registrations, and digital intellectual property.
- Store the inventory securely and update it when accounts change.
How do password managers and platform legacy tools help?
- Many password managers offer emergency access that releases your vault to a named contact after a waiting period.
- Google's Inactive Account Manager, Apple's Legacy Contact, and Facebook's legacy contact let you name people in advance.
- Those in-platform choices carry legal weight in California because they rank ahead of your will for that account.
How should cryptocurrency be handled?
- Self-custody crypto is controlled by private keys or a seed phrase; if no one can find them, the assets are effectively unrecoverable.
- Estate documents can describe where access instructions are kept without writing the seed phrase itself into the will, which may become public.
- Assets on an exchange follow that exchange's account and death-claim process.
Key takeaways
- Digital assets need both legal authority and practical access.
- Platform tools can override your will for that account under California law, so set them deliberately.
- Keep an updated, secure inventory and clear instructions for crypto keys.
- Rubric helps clients organize this inventory as part of overall wealth management; your estate attorney drafts the fiduciary-access language.
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