Privacy Guides

I'm dead, I don't care.

Bitwarden shared vault. There's also a feature where you can designate someone to gain access to your vault via a dead man's switch.

My wife has access to my password database. If I go before her, she's in charge of going through all my accounts and shutting stuff down.

My father actually just passed away a few months ago. I had convinced him to use unique passwords for everything, but he couldn't keep track of them all, so he just wrote them all down on a piece of paper that he kept on his computer desk. When he passed, my sister took a photo of his password sheet and we both have been going through his stuff, closing accounts, transferring money, notifying his social media accounts of his passing, etc.

For the record, my dad had a Trust set up, with my sister as the executor of the Trust, so we've already talked about money stuff (even with my dad while he was still alive) and we're both in agreement. And we're both decent people, so there's no complications with dividing his estate or anything. My sister is in charge of all his finances, and she's been very straightforward with me about what he had and how it's being divided up.

EDIT: If my wife goes before me, I would probably give my sister access to my password database. She and I are pretty close, and I'd trust her with that access.

The intent is for access to my data to die with me. I rather not have people sort though my private shit once I'm dead. I may pass off a few logins and decide an heir to my Steam account if I know it's coming.

I'd encrypt my drives if I wasn't so damn worried about locking my self out. I don't think an unsuspecting mourner could survive that much hentai.

In my filing cabinet that contains my will and other emergency documents I have a printout of the emergency backup codes for my password manager and my google account. That should be enough for my heirs to get whatever they need and want.

I have a Next Of Kin (NOK) box. Everything anyone needs to know is in it, plus instructions to hire someone in a grim reaper costume to stand in the back and pretend to look for someone in attendance.

I use Bitwarden with a handful of family members. You can share vault entries. I've shared the ones that are important (utilities, services) but not the ones that are critical (financials, security). The access to the critical stuff is encrypted and on 3 pieces of cold storage, that gets verified/validated every year. Family knows how to access it.

EDIT: I forgot to mention, for the critical items they also need my yubikey to gain access. So they can't just remotely drain my accounts, they'd need to over my dead body.

Deviant has a good talk about this kind of thing (including some other situations to think about) in "A Talk About Risk & Preparedness" - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6ihrGNGesfI

This is exactly the same question I asked 3 years ago when my brother died, and left all his tech stuff to his non-tech wife and kids.

Fortunately I was able to migrate whatever was important to cloud-based services.

But what will happen if this happens to me? I have no other siblings, and I made it a habit not consorting with techies: I don’t like nerds 😉, and I prefer to talk about other subjects in my spare time.

One of the reasons I used to self host a lot is privacy, and because I am an Open Source advocate. So I migrated everything important to commercial offerings which supported both, or at least the Privacy part.

I share a passwords through a password manager with my wife and kids, which gives them the keys to the kingdom. They can use my master password to unlock the doors. I also keep a paper with my most important passwords in a place my wife knows about, and can access without any proof of my death. Joint safes in the bank typically get sealed until the tax people have released the accounts.

Everything which I host myself now is disposable, and my wife knows she can turn it off without a second thought.

I'm just gonna let them rot adding to the dead internet. Perhaps someone will come across this comment 100 years after my death perhaps not. When I'm dead what do i care.

@Whooping_Seal Yes, using a password manager with family sharing and for the self hosted stuff writing a wiki on how to keep it up or export the important data is my way to go.

I typed up directions to my wife about how to access all of my accounts. I left blanks like _______ and used a pencil to write in all of the important information like what 2FA app to use and passwords to some key stuff.

Self hosted vaultwarden with the Deadman setup.

I have no accounts that anyone would like to access. Bank accounts and anything important a will would handle.