WE ARE doing more and more online. Indeed, a lot of our personal assets and information are being stored in digital format. But what happens to our digital assets when we die? Solicitor Sioned Thomas, of RDP Law, explains why we need to give it more thought.

Unless we take action to protect our digital assets, things can get very complicated and messy for our loved ones who may wish to retrieve them when we die.

Digital assets can include any manner of things, such as blogs, eBooks or even bitcoin. Other items, such as photographs stored on phones and social media sites, may hold great sentimental value.

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Personal representatives deal with a person’s estate after they die. They are obliged to value all items held by the deceased, including digital assets. However, they often face two very difficult issues: how to access the information after death, and who owns the data?

Quite often, companies which hold this information are reluctant to grant representatives access because of confidentiality and privacy issues. There could also be intellectual property implications.

In a recent case, a widow spent thousands of pounds on a battle with the tech giant Apple to try to obtain photographs of her daughter, which were stored on her late husband’s mobile phone. Under UK law, she had no legal right to access the information but, after a protracted three-year legal wrangle, the judge at Central London County Court ruled in her favour and she was eventually awarded access to her late husband’s phone.

When we create an account with online service-providers, we sign up to their terms and conditions, which vary substantially. If we own an online account, we should be aware of what happens on death so we can plan ahead and prevent our online assets of sentimental or monetary value from being lost, locked or destroyed.

Some options offered in terms and conditions are:

  • Permission for the personal representative of an estate to access information following the death of the account holder
  • Selecting a nominee who can access the account following death
  • Termination of the account and deletion of all information
  • Content kept for some time before it is finally deleted.

Life is changing constantly, and with that comes a variety of new and different assets, which we may hold dear, but actually give little thought to how we protect them.

When drafting wills, we should be adding clauses to deal with online assets, giving permission for someone to retrieve them on death, and specifying how they do that.

Leaving it too late can cause a real problem for your loved ones.

For legal advice on wills and digital assets, call RDP Law director Sioned Thomas on 01633 413500 or email sioned.thomas@rdplaw.co.uk

This legal column has been provided in conjunction with The Law Society.