First Steps to Assist Digital Estate Planning

As I have previously discussed, even people who believe they have acomprehensive estate plan may have overlooked what happens to their digitalassets when they die. The idea is to address digital assets in your existingestate plan. Attorney coach, James Lamm, is teaching attorneys how to integratespecifics of digital estate planning.

Many people possess digital assets thatmay be of great value to them. However, the value of web domains, photos,videos, email, and social-media accounts may be lost if the owner does not takeproper legal steps ahead of time. Digital estate planning is more complicatedthan traditional estate planning because the owner of assets is tasked withmaking sure to leave access to the heir. However, these sites may be passwordprotected, encrypted, and governed by privacy laws. Lamm suggests some firststeps that would help in the digital estate -planning process.

1. Go through a test run and ask yourself if you were incapacitated today would your loved ones be able to gain access to your digital assets? Who would you want to have access?
2. Keep a record of all of the things in your digital inventory with the user name and passwords.
3. Keep a back up of your digital asset information.
4. Reduce your plan to writing.

See Christine Benz, Do You Have a Plan for Your Digital ‘Estate’?, Morning Star, Oct. 3, 2013.