Estate Planning Blog

Does Your Estate Plan Include Your Digital Life?

Many people think their estate plan is done when they have a will, but today’s estate includes more than traditional assets. Digital lives need to be protected, too, or financial and personal assets could be lost, says an article from Saving Advice, “Don’t Forget Your Digital POA: New Laws Grant Agents Access To Your Email, Online Accounts And Crypto.”

New laws concerning RUFADAA (Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act) now allow authorized agents to manage digital assets, but only if estate planning documents are properly prepared. If any part of your life is online, whether paying bills or posting on social, you need to be aware of how digital assets are addressed in estate plans.

Everyone underestimates how many digital assets they own. Most people have email accounts, streaming subscriptions, cloud storage, social media profiles, loyalty rewards, and cryptocurrency. Accounts holding photos or important legal documents on client portals are also part of your digital assets.

A Power of Attorney drafted years ago probably doesn’t have language addressing digital assets. Your family won’t be able to open your phone, download photos, gain access to crypto investments, or retrieve emails without specific digital authorization. This comes as a surprise to families who expect everything to be covered by the POA created in the past. In most states, the law requires explicit consent before agents can access digital assets.

If you own cryptocurrency, you’ll need a playbook in case of incapacity or death. First, you’ll need a digital executor who is familiar with how crypto works. They’ll need access to recovery phrases, private keys, or authentication devices to get to your crypto wallet. Millions of dollars in Bitcoin and Ethereum have already been lost because access information was not documented and shared. Even if you have legal authority to access these assets, if you don’t know how, there’s no help desk to call.

Email and cell phones unlock almost everything. Almost every financial institution, medical portal, social media platform, and crypto exchange uses emails or cell phones to reset passwords or verify logins. If your agent can’t access email or the phone, managing your digital life will be next to impossible. Two-factor authentication codes and facial recognition are great for security, but terrible for managing another person’s assets. Have a plan for this.

There are still privacy laws to consider. RUFADAA was created to balance privacy rights with estate administration by setting limits on private emails, chats, and direct messages. In some circumstances, a custodian may need a court order to release account data. Companies also adhere to the Terms of Service Agreements (TOSAs), which users click to create accounts, and may not release data. Personal account settings may override the POA or your will.

Whether you live in Columbia, Missouri or elsewhere, a modern estate plan must address digital lives. The good news is the law is catching up to providing ways to manage accounts when someone is incapacitated or after they die. Preparation is still critical. A revised estate plan needs to include provisions for digital assets, naming a digital executor, and preparing a thorough inventory.

Visit our website www.MoTrustLaw.com to get more estate planning information and to subscribe to our complimentary e-newsletter.  Our e-newsletter is designed to provide valuable information to residents of Moberly, Macon, Kirksville, Salisbury, Columbia and surrounding areas.

Reference: Saving Advice (May 22, 2026) “Don’t Forget Your Digital POA: New Laws Grant Agents Access To Your Email, Online Accounts And Crypto”

Options to Protect Bitcoin Inheritances

Billions in Bitcoin are at risk of permanent loss if holders become incapacitated, die, or lose the information needed to access their accounts. Today, a new generation of inheritance tools is giving Bitcoin owners a better way to protect their investments, says a recent article, “Bitcoin inheritance is a ticking problem and the tools to solve it are finally maturing,” from Startup Fortune.

The “not your keys, not your coins” principle of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies centers control of the digital assets solely with the owner. This works fine until the owner is incapacitated or dies. There’s no bank, no custodian, no help desk. A death certificate and a power of attorney are virtually meaningless in the world of cryptocurrency.

Fortunes have already been lost for many individuals and their heirs. It’s estimated that 20% of all Bitcoin ever purchased is already inaccessible. Unless owners begin to treat cryptocurrency as a valuable part of their estate plan, this number will continue to increase.

The “dead man’s switch” is the concept used when discussing Bitcoin inheritance, but it covers many different implementations. A service can monitor check-in activity and alert a designated executor if the owner goes silent for a set period. However, this doesn’t hand over the keys or move funds; it merely serves as an alarm. A more aggressive service uses a Bitcoin feature to pre-sign a transaction to pay out to an heir’s address after a set period of inactivity. This bypasses any third-party involvement completely.

This last service poses a risk. Computer code doesn’t know the difference between a missed check-in because of hospitalization or death. If the set time is incorrect, a premature transfer could occur, and there’s no way to reverse it.

Trying to solve cryptocurrency inheritance solutions presents a tension between human error and the limits of computer engineering. How to solve this? There are four practical models to consider:

• Pure self-custody with documented and shared instructions can work if the executor knows where to locate the needed documents and how to navigate seed phrases, digital wallets, etc.
• A multisig wallet is a cryptocurrency wallet requiring two or more private keys to authorize transactions. The multisig wallet distributes control and responsibility, but the people involved will still need to know how to use the account’s private key.
• Provider-assisted collaborative custody is the use of a third-party service company, so both the user and the service company share control of crypto keys to gain access to the Bitcoin account. The user holds two keys to maintain control, and the provider holds one key to offer recovery assistance and inheritance support.
• The fourth model is the use of a timelock to distribute Bitcoin if there is a lack of activity on the account. This option presents a potential problem, as most security breaches occur not at death but in the years leading up to it, when family members gain premature access.

To succeed, a Bitcoin inheritance requires traditional estate-planning tools—such as a revocable living trust that explicitly includes digital assets and authorizes the trustee to access cryptocurrency. This lets Bitcoin go directly to heirs without going through probate. The trust document may need to specifically address Bitcoin, authorize the trustee to hold digital assets, and address incapacity and death.

If self-custody inheritance is too complex, there are ETFs offered through traditional brokerage accounts, which transfer through existing financial infrastructure and receive a step-up in basis at death. The trade-off? Giving up direct control of the underlying asset.

Given the challenges of passing cryptocurrency to heirs, addressing it in an estate plan sooner rather than later is critical to ensure it is not permanently lost.

Visit our website www.MoTrustLaw.com to get more estate planning information and to subscribe to our complimentary e-newsletter.  Our e-newsletter is designed to provide valuable information to residents of Moberly, Macon, Kirksville, Salisbury, Columbia and surrounding areas.

Reference: Startup Fortune (April 24, 2026) “Bitcoin inheritance is a ticking problem and the tools to solve it are finally maturing”

What are the Best Ways to Protect Digital Assets?

Boomers may be the last generation to use cash and paper checks for financial transactions. However, according to a recent article from GO Banking Rates, “6 Ways for Boomers To Preserve Their Digital Estate and Online Assets,” many have switched to digital wallets.

With the rise of digital finance, it’s crucial to stay vigilant. While hackers may be more skilled in the digital world, you have the power to protect your digital assets. Here’s what you can do.

Emails are rife with scammers. Even an email from your bank shouldn’t be trusted. Never click on links within an email—go to the website from your browser instead. “Phishing scams,” where an email from someone you know asks for quick action, should always be treated with the utmost care. Misspellings or weird URLs should be red flags to alert you to a scam.

Keep a close eye on financial accounts. Fraud is best detected early. Check for unknown charges on credit cards and bank statements. One common technique is to make a small charge on a credit card to see if it is detected, followed by a sizeable charge. Set up your accounts to send alerts for every transaction to fight this.

Don’t go online on unsecured networks. Your local coffee shop or library is not the place to conduct financial transactions. Public Wi-Fi networks are not secure, ever. It only takes one opportunity to clean out your bank accounts.

Take software updates on cell phones, laptops, tablets and desktop computers. Many software updates are sent when vulnerabilities are spotted. If you don’t take the software update, you could open yourself to hackers.

Go for the two-factor authentication. Some people feel that having to go through a two-step process to log into a favorite site is too much work. This added layer of security makes it harder for hackers to access financial information and access your systems. It’s worth the extra time.

Don’t use a wimpy password. Passwords are notoriously easy for hackers to figure out. Birthdays, pet names, street addresses and even the word “password” are common and quickly figured out. Did you know there’s software used to crack passwords? Hackers do. Make yours harder to figure out using a combination of letters, symbols and numbers.

While protecting your digital assets, don’t forget to protect your traditional assets. If you haven’t already secured your estate with a last will and testament and protected yourself with estate planning documents, like Power of Attorney, Healthcare Power of Attorney, Living Will, and medical directives, make an appointment with an experienced estate planning attorney. You’ll be glad to have both your digital and traditional assets protected.

Reference: GO Banking Rates (May 30, 2024) “6 Ways for Boomers To Preserve Their Digital Estate and Online Assets”

Who Gets Access to Your Digital Assets Account When You Die?

With so much of our lives now lived online, it’s hard to remember how we lived in a world without email, internet, or mobile phones. However, the question of what happens to our online lives after we die becomes a challenge for loved ones, says a recent article, “One day you’ll leave this earth, but your data will live on in a messy future” from WFIN.COM. Few people 65 and older have a digital estate plan, meaning the next generation must clean up what’s left behind.

Let’s start by defining digital assets and digital legacy. Digital assets are anything in digital format, including photos, videos, emails, social media account content, websites and cryptocurrency. A digital legacy is all the digital assets left behind when someone passes.

A digital legacy may include personal, financial and creative digital property. For instance, if you’re a prolific blogger, you own intellectual property. What do you want to have happen to your blogs after you’ve died? Or, if you have a craft business on Etsy, who will manage it?

Digital assets don’t disappear when you become incapacitated or die. They live on unless someone has been designated as a digital executor and there is a plan to manage the assets. What happens also depends upon the platform’s privacy and legacy policies. In some cases, accounts and their contents are deleted after a certain period of inactivity.

What happens if no digital estate planning takes place?

• Online financial assets, including bank accounts and cryptocurrency, have economic value your executor needs to be able to access and manage. If they can’t locate a username and password or are stymied by third-party verification like facial recognition, gaining access to your assets will take a long time.
• If you’re among the millions who enjoy creating a family history with genealogy websites, years of work you may have wanted to pass to the next generation may become inaccessible or vanish.
• Identity theft and fraud are common occurrences when digital assets are not managed or deleted after the original owner dies.
• Some platforms allow users to name a legacy contact who can access their accounts, gather and download content and close accounts. You’ll need to review your social accounts to determine what each platform permits and set up legacy or memory accounts.

A digital executor doesn’t always need passwords and usernames to delete, memorialize, or close your accounts. However, they will still need an inventory of your accounts and a clear directive explaining what you want to happen to your assets after your passing. Password sharing, while common, is not legal. Most states have passed some version of the RUFADAA—Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act. Talk to your estate planning attorney about incorporating digital estate planning into your estate plan.

As a side note, if gathering your account information seems overly burdensome, imagine what would happen if your executor, already busy with so many tasks, needed to become a digital sleuth to determine what assets you have and how to access them.

Reference: WFIN.COM (May 11, 2024) “One day you’ll leave this earth, but your data will live on in a messy future”