Digital life · 20 min
A note about your digital life
Writing down which accounts you have and what you would want done with them, so nobody has to guess.
So much of life is now online: photographs, messages, accounts, subscriptions. If you were ill or died, the people closest to you might not know what exists or what you would want. A short note, kept safe, takes away a lot of guesswork.
The steps
Four small steps,in your own time.
List the main online accounts you have: email, photos, social media, shopping, subscriptions and any online banking.
For each, write what you would want to happen: kept, closed, passed on, or shared with a named person. Photographs often matter most.
Look at whether your main accounts have settings to name a trusted contact or legacy contact, and set them up if they do.
Store the note with your important papers, and tell one trusted person where it is. Do not write passwords in the note itself.
The reason
Why it helps
Families often struggle to access or close accounts after someone dies or becomes unable to manage them. A clear note makes your wishes known and spares them a difficult search. Naming a trusted contact through the account's own settings is usually safer than sharing passwords.
A gentle variation
If you help a parent with their technology, do this with them, at their pace. Starting with their photographs, and how they would like them kept, is often a gentle way in.
WE · TRIBE
Try itwith someone.
Do it on the same day as a partner or friend, each writing your own note, and tell each other where you have put it.
Try it today
Today, list your five most important online accounts and what you would want to happen to each.
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