Educational program: how to access the digital assets of a deceased person

The death of a loved one is always a difficult loss. Moreover, in most cases it is followed by a lot of formalities, one of which is entering into inheritance. In the modern world, not only money in accounts, cars and real estate are valuable, but also the digital assets of the deceased — accounts on various platforms, as well as cryptocurrency wallets.

Russian legislation currently says nothing about the period during which a social network or instant messenger must retain the account of a deceased person.

There is also no clear list of actions for heirs to gain access to such an account. As a rule, three options are possible: deleting the account at the request of the heirs, special “memorable” status of the account, or providing limited access to it without the ability to look at the correspondence of the deceased— head of the law firm “Afonin, Bozhor and Partners” Mikhail Bozhor. — Thus, when it comes to accounts on social networks, it is advisable to ask your relative in advance to set such settings on social networks that will allow you to access them in the event of his death. Without such settings, attempts to access your account can take a lot of time and are highly likely to be unsuccessful. If you try to file a lawsuit against the administration of a social network for access, then with a high probability the court will reject the claim, since the page on the social network contains personal correspondence, the secret of which is protected even after the death of a person. In addition, in Russia there is practically no judicial practice on this issue.

At the same time, if a relative is not ready to leave you the data necessary to access the account, then it is advisable to ask him to include an additional condition in the will: that he bequeaths access to social networks to one of the heirs (list the specific addresses of such pages) and agrees to the disclosure of personal data and the content of the testator’s correspondence on such social networks to him.

Such wording in the will can help you gain access to the account before trial, and if the case goes to court, it will serve as additional evidence in your favor.,” says Oleg Dulsky, a lawyer in the field of digital law.

It is also important to take care of the issue of preserving the telephone number that belonged to the deceased. After all, if a cellular operator finds out about the death of a subscriber, he will allow someone else to purchase such a number. And, accordingly, the new owner of the number will potentially be able to gain access to social networks and instant messengers where the deceased was registered by phone number. In order to remove this risk, you need to contact your telecom operator with a death certificate, a certificate of inheritance and documents confirming your relationship with the deceased to re-register such a telephone number in your name.

If we talk about crypto wallets, then digital currency is recognized as property under current Russian legislation. Accordingly, the cryptocurrency in the wallets of the deceased is included in the general inheritance and must be distributed among the heirs. At the same time, even if you received a certificate of inheritance indicating the cryptocurrency, you still need to gain access to such a walletnotes Mikhail Bozhor.

If we are talking about a wallet that is installed as an application on the phone or computer of the deceased, or a so-called “cold”, that is, a hardware wallet (usually in the form of a flash drive), then a person will not be able to access it without knowing the password.

Accordingly, in this case, it would be more correct to ask your relative in advance for the password or key phrase to access the wallet. If we are talking about an account on a crypto exchange where the deceased was authorized under his real name, then you can apply to re-register the account in your name, attaching a certificate of inheritance rightsadds Oleg Dulsky.

source: Source Rossiyskaya Gazeta

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