A traditional estate plan covers your house, car, and bank accounts. It almost certainly doesn’t cover your 150+ online accounts, your crypto, your cloud photos, or your smart home. Here is the inventory that fills the gap.
Your Estate Plan Has a Blind Spot
You’ve got a will. Maybe a trust. Life insurance. Beneficiary designations on your retirement accounts. The physical and financial stuff is handled.
But open your email and search “your account” or “welcome to.” Count your browser’s saved passwords. The average person has between 100 and 200 online accounts. Each one holds something, money, files, photos, subscriptions with recurring charges, or access to something that matters.
Your estate plan almost certainly doesn’t cover any of this. Your family won’t just lose access to Netflix. They won’t be able to pay the mortgage from your online banking portal, find your life insurance policy number, stop your credit cards from billing, or recover crypto that has no “forgot password” button. If you haven’t thought about what happens to your passwords when you die, the answer is: nothing good.
A digital estate plan fills that gap. It’s not a legal document, it’s a practical inventory of every digital account and asset someone would need to manage if you couldn’t.
Financial Accounts
This is where urgency is highest. If your family can’t get into your financial accounts, they can’t pay bills, manage funds, or figure out what you owe.
Banking. Every checking and savings account you access online. Include the bank name, login URL, username, and password.
Investment accounts. Brokerage accounts, robo-advisors, stock trading apps. Fidelity, Vanguard, Schwab, Robinhood, Wealthfront. Beneficiary designations don’t help your family manage these in the short term.
Retirement accounts. 401(k), IRA, Roth IRA, pension portals. Your family still needs login access to check balances, initiate distributions, and handle paperwork.
Insurance portals. Health, life, auto, homeowner’s, renter’s, umbrella, disability. Include the portal URL, credentials, and policy numbers. Half the battle is knowing which company to call, the other half is knowing where to log in.
Mortgage and loan accounts. The servicer portal where payments are made. If your spouse doesn’t have their own login, they’ll need yours. Don’t forget auto loans, student loans, and HELOCs.
Credit cards. Every card, with the issuer’s portal login. Your family will need to cancel cards, dispute charges, and redirect autopay.
Payment apps. PayPal, Venmo, Zelle, Cash App. If there’s a balance sitting in any of these, it needs to be accessible.
Tax software. TurboTax, H&R Block, or your CPA’s portal. Your family will need prior-year returns, and the fastest way to pull them is through whatever platform you filed with.
Crypto and Digital Assets
A traditional will inherits the house; a digital plan inherits the keys to everything else.
Crypto is the highest-stakes category on this list. There’s no bank to call, no support ticket that resets your access, no court that can order a blockchain to release funds. If nobody has your keys, the money is gone. Permanently.
Exchange accounts. Coinbase, Kraken, Binance, Gemini. Include the login email, password, and 2FA backup codes.
Wallet seed phrases. Every software wallet (MetaMask, Phantom, Trust Wallet) and hardware wallet (Ledger, Trezor) has a seed phrase, the master key. Label each one clearly with the wallet name and which chains it covers.
Hardware wallet locations and PINs. Your family needs to know where the physical device is and what the PIN is. The seed phrase is the ultimate backup, but having the device and PIN makes recovery simpler.
DeFi positions. If you’ve got funds staked, liquidity in pools, or other protocol positions, a seed phrase alone won’t cut it. Write a plain-language note explaining which protocols, which chains, and how to withdraw.
NFTs. If you hold NFTs with real value, note which marketplaces (OpenSea, Blur, Magic Eden) your collection is listed on.
Email and Communication
Your primary email is probably the single most important account in your digital life. Password resets for nearly every other service route through email. If your family can get into your email, they can reset passwords for most other things.
Primary email. Gmail, Outlook, ProtonMail, whatever you use as your main account. Include the password and any 2FA backup codes. If you use a hardware security key, note where it’s stored.
Secondary emails. Any accounts used for shopping, newsletters, or specific services. Some people keep a separate email for financial accounts, if that’s you, your family needs both.
Messaging apps. WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram. These may contain important conversations or shared documents. Some are device-bound and can’t be recovered without the original phone.
Work email. If you’re self-employed, your work email likely contains contracts, invoices, and client information your family (or business partner) needs.
Cloud Storage and Files
Most cloud providers delete inactive accounts after 12 to 24 months. No logins, no files.
Google Drive / Google One. Access to your Google account also unlocks Gmail, Photos, Calendar, and Contacts.
iCloud. Apple’s Legacy Contact feature requires a death certificate and only covers Apple services. Having the login is faster and more flexible.
Dropbox, OneDrive, and others. Any service where you’ve stored files. Don’t overlook NAS devices at home, those require their own login.
Photo services. Google Photos, iCloud Photos, Amazon Photos. Family photos can’t be replaced. Note which service holds the originals.
Backups. Backblaze, Carbonite, iDrive, or any local/cloud backup service. These may be the only copy of certain files.
Social Media
Each platform handles deceased accounts differently. Having the login makes everything faster than going through official channels.
Facebook. Has a Legacy Contact feature for managing a memorialized profile, but the legacy contact can’t log in as you or read your messages. You can configure your preference in Settings > Memorialization Settings.
Instagram. Allows memorialization with proof of death, but there’s no legacy contact feature. The login lets your family download photos directly.
Twitter/X. No legacy or memorialization feature. Deactivation requests from family are slow. With the login, your family can download a data archive and deactivate the account themselves.
LinkedIn. Has a memorialization process. The login lets your family download connections, messages, and content.
TikTok and YouTube. TikTok can deactivate accounts on request. YouTube is handled through Google’s Inactive Account Manager if it’s tied to a Google account.
Subscriptions and Services
Recurring charges don’t stop on their own. Credit cards keep getting billed. Your family needs to know what’s running and how to shut it off.
Streaming. Netflix, Spotify, Apple Music, Disney+, Hulu, HBO Max, YouTube Premium, Audible.
Software subscriptions. Adobe Creative Cloud, Microsoft 365, Notion, Canva, and any SaaS tools you pay for.
Domains and hosting. Domain names expire and can be lost permanently if not renewed. If you run a website, the hosting account needs managing too, and for a business, losing a domain is a real problem.
App subscriptions. Check Settings > Subscriptions on iOS, or Google Play > Subscriptions on Android. You’ve probably got more active subscriptions than you think.
Memberships. Paid Slack workspaces, Discord Nitro, Patreon, online courses, professional associations.
Smart Home and Devices
Modern homes run on accounts and passwords. If your family can’t access these, they can’t control the house.
Device PINs and passcodes. Phone, tablet, laptop. These are the gateway to everything else on those devices, including authenticator apps.
Smart home hub. Google Home, Amazon Alexa, Apple HomeKit, Samsung SmartThings. Lights, thermostat, locks, speakers, all tied to an account.
Wi-Fi and router. The router admin login and Wi-Fi password. If the router needs resetting or the ISP needs contacting, someone needs the account details.
Security cameras and alarms. Ring, Nest, Arlo, SimpliSafe. These often have separate accounts from your smart home hub.
Vehicle accounts. Tesla, Ford, GM, or any car with connected services. These control remote start, location tracking, and charging for EVs.
Smart locks and garage doors. The physical key is the backup, but the account controls user access and settings.
Recovery and 2FA
This is the section people skip, and it causes the most frustration. Your family can have every password on this list and still get locked out if they can’t get past two-factor authentication.
2FA backup codes. Every service that uses 2FA gives you one-time backup codes when you enable it. Go through your major accounts and save them: Google, Apple, your bank, your crypto exchange, your email.
Authenticator app backup. Google Authenticator supports cloud sync now. Authy has its own backup system. Whatever you use, make sure your family can access the authenticator, or has backup codes for every account it protects.
Recovery phone numbers. If your phone number is the recovery method for important accounts, your family needs to keep that number active. Note your carrier and account PIN.
Hardware security keys. If you use a YubiKey, your family needs to know where it is and which accounts it’s tied to.
Apple/Google account recovery keys. Both offer recovery keys as a last resort. If you’ve generated them, include them. If you haven’t, now’s a good time.
How to Store and Share All of This
The checklist is one thing. Where you put it is another.
# 60-minute pass → add primary email + 2FA backup codes → add bank logins + insurance portals → add crypto seed phrases + hardware PINs # later → assign each secret to one recipient → set per-person waiting time (1 to 365 days) → tell each recipient the plan exists
Paper in a safe. The simplest approach, and the weakest. It goes stale the moment you change a password, open a new account, or cancel a subscription. Nobody reprints this regularly.
Password manager with emergency access. Better than paper because it stays current. But emergency access in password managers is always a bolt-on feature, not the main focus. LastPass has trust issues after the 2022 breach. 1Password doesn’t offer in-app emergency access. Bitwarden gives the recipient your entire vault (all or nothing). NordPass locks the waiting period at 7 days.
AbsentKey. We built it for this problem. You store your secrets, passwords, files, notes, recovery codes, and assign each one to a specific person. For each person, you set a waiting time between 1 and 365 days. Nothing happens until a recipient requests access. If you can respond, you approve or deny. If you can’t, the timer runs out and they get in automatically.
Different items can go to different people, each with their own waiting time. No check-ins, no heartbeat pings. End-to-end encrypted, zero-knowledge architecture. Receiving is free (your family doesn’t need paid accounts). Text secrets and files, so you can store documents and instructions alongside passwords.
Premium is $0.99/month or $9.99/year. iOS and Android. Source-available on GitHub.
FAQ
Do I need a lawyer for this?
No. A digital estate plan isn’t a legal document, it’s a practical inventory and delivery system for your digital credentials. It works alongside your legal will, which handles property and legal designations. Your lawyer decides who inherits what. Your digital estate plan makes sure they can actually get to it. You can set one up in an afternoon.
How often should I update it?
Every six months. Go through the checklist, remove closed accounts, add new ones, update changed passwords, refresh your 2FA backup codes. Takes about fifteen minutes. The biggest risk isn’t getting it wrong, it’s setting it up once and never touching it again.
What happens to my accounts if I don’t plan for this?
Depends on the platform. Some services (Google, Apple, Facebook) have next-of-kin processes, but they’re slow, limited, and require death certificates. Many have no process at all and will just delete inactive accounts. Crypto with no recovery path is gone permanently. Subscriptions keep billing until a credit card expires. It turns into a months-long mess, and some things are lost for good.
You don’t need to knock out this entire checklist in one sitting. Start with the high-priority stuff: primary email, financial accounts, and crypto if you hold any. Add one category at a time.
Download AbsentKey and get the basics into your vault today.
