(Not sure what category is right for this, so feel free to move)
This is a topic that’s been on my mind a lot lately, mainly because I just had my first kid. All of my financial, life documents are stored digitally on my NAS, and also encrypted and backed up to rsync.net (and replicated across a couple different computers with NextCloud). But I’m worried about my spouse’s/son’s access to those things after I pass away. Yes my wife has logins to all these things (but who knows if she’ll remember the password) and my concern is that if a credit card expires or a hard drive breaks, she’ll have no way to recover anything.
Currently, my wife’s instructions are to get in touch with an old chemistry professor of mine, and Unix guru who can probably piece together some stuff, but…it’s far from optimal. One of the problems is that everything is encrypted - because it’s sensitive personal information, and that’s standard security procedure. Another problem is that I use different passwords for every device, have Yubikeys with PGP keys for decryption, etc. All standard security practices because I want my and my family’s data to be safe but unfortunately these practices severely hinder any potential recovery possibility.
I thought it might be nice to at least get a conversation going about this. What happens to your digital legacy when you pass away? How are you dealing with this problem? Can we come up with a good solution?
Financial stuff should have your wife’s name on the account, or at least have her listed along with your child under “transfer upon death”
Credit cards, eh who cares … if you have a card in your name only, and you die owing them money, they’re screwed. they could try to come after your estate, but usually don’t unless it’s a lot of money.
These are good questions to have for a lawyer specializing in estate planning and/or probate law.
I don’t know what other sort of “personal information” you would want your family to have access to. You could always leave written instructions in a safety deposit box at the bank. Ownership of the box should fall to whomever survives you, depending on the probate laws for your location.
What if a drive fails? Rule #1, RAID is not a backup.
Maybe a legal trustee/bank secure deposit box for ultimate failover should all living points of entry be lost. There would still be a wag to get to it eventually by course of law.
I would talk to a local lawyer or notary about this. There is most likely not only the possibility to deposit a will, but maybe also a external drive with the most important documents and password and maybe some instructions.
Any kind of storage tech / raid server you’re currently maintaining probably won’t stay up for more than a month - might get sold on facebook/ebay/for scrap - or might rot in the shed.
Re bank accounts and money and mortgages, wills take time. Best thing you can do are probably joint accounts where there’s only one account and both you/your wife own it whole.
Any kind of cloud storage if it’s tied to an account your significant others don’t use regularly (e.g. not a family account), may have some way of expiring into your significant others access, but they probably will not have interest in maintaining it, unless they’re using it already.
This is something I was thinking about in the past, and I wanted to look into StorJ for this reason, but this is not an easy topic to think about.
There’s ofcourse a difference between e.g. dying of cancer vs dying unexpectedly of a heart attack (former let’s you “put affairs in order”, latter doesn’t), … please exercise and manage stress.
Hypothetically, at work, one would prepare a handover document, so when one hands in ones notice (or go on leave) ones replacement can find (most of) the dead bodies.
Same for ones job as guardian of family data…
The way I see it, in the same was as backups, there is long term data, and transitory data.
Perhaps detailed instructions of what is where, for long term data to be stored with other important docs (birth certs, deeds, marriage docs, spare registered ubikey ) which should be reviewed annually (spring cleaning) and perhaps a changing list on paper in your home office/workstation for the transitory stuff?
Transitory passwords can be shared for SO to add to their password manager, long term might want to be stored with the instructions, even if in a password protected USB (keepass etc)
other than things like music, personal video and pictures.
delete it all.
any socials. sign in and close the accounts if there’s an auto login.
the rest will just sit till data rot takes it from the web.
I share this fear, “How can my wife maintain the NAS when I am gone?”
I have a KeePass with everything inside it and its decently well organized; so my wife will never be without my passwords. I fill out any applicable field so she could pick it up and access anything and everything. I even note which 2FA methods are in-use and what account is a recovery method. Can’t forget those backup keys!
But also inside this KeePass I have notes on how to do basic tasks, such as run updates on the PiHole/Unbound/PiVPN cluster. In multiple places I reference my Confluence space which has cut-sheets and diagrams and otherwise every bit of documentation possible. I’ve tried to write documentation to the point that she could up and move and re-deploy most the lab and retain services and data.
I keep a monthly backup of the KeePass on my Linode so the real point of failure for her, would be if she misplaced my Pri/Pub keypair. But we have a few copies of that so I’m hoping that doesn’t happen.
Not too many options other than either her or an individual you trust learning how to maintain things after you’re gone or starting to migrate essential self hosted services to fully managed services.
If you go with keeping self hosted services. Depending on what works best for your S.O. , simple, well documented, and clearly written instructions or even a video explaining things. Of course keeping those things up to date would be important and maybe be re-visited when a big change is made or even just once a year would be better than nothing.
Also…if you haven’t already done so… UPDATE YOUR WILL! It is a legal document that states exactly what your wishes are after your unfortunate demise…
I’ve also been thinking about this lately. We’ve had a NAS serving our home for more than 10 years and me, my wife and 3 kids all use it to store our data. They only know how to power on the server, nothing more but my wife would know how to access the backup HDDs.
For my passwords I use an excel file and my wife knows where I keep a USB drive with a backup file.
For banking accounts, insurance and anything else my wife is included so no problem there.
What I realize now is I should be writing a document with some instructions, what to do in case I die.
Maybe this is a military-ism but I keep a logbook/passdown of all changes that are made. Then every year, I update the documentation to reflect the final state of things. My wife can and is capable of managing the things by following the Barney instructions, but she still asks me to do things because she cannot be bothered, like hey. can you change the timer on the grow lights and heating pad for the vegetable starts?
Ultimately, if she had to, she could take the log book and the documentation binder to a tech minded person or MSP to get what she needs.
They’ll never find my private reserves, that much is certain.
On a more serious note, I hope my digital legacy remains as the knowledge I’ve shared on various forums and the software/projects I’ve contributed to. Beyond that, my primary legacy, I hope, will be non-digital. I might be talented with technology, but I really don’t want it to dominate my life.
I’ve got a document in a safe at my house with the login to a password manager, a yubikey and relevant information. Being in my late 20s and unattached, my parents have the safe code. At such a time as the circumstances change, that safe code will be reset and knowledge will be transferred to my SO.
I’m curious if Yubikeys “expire” so to speak. can they be trusted to still work if they’ve been sitting in a safe, not plugged in, for a decade?
I think you can keep that kind of information with an attorney since the confidentiality policy is part of their job. I have a very good relationship with my attorney. When I was on trial for stealing my girlfriend’s car, which I bought for her, and yet there was no sign of forced entry, I needed help in court and turned to Middlesex County Criminal Defense Lawyer as they have a very good reputation. That’s how I met my attorney, who became a very good friend whom I would trust with any of my personal information and documents.
