Comments on: Keep a list of websites with your will?

By: Julie Starr

Julie Starr — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 17:55:24 +0000

Yes I saw your piece and linked to it a while back. Do these sites need to ask us what we want to happen to our account when we die and maybe give us a couple of options? Like, would you like your account deleted immediately, after a month, a year? Would you like us to do nothing until we hear from your lawyer? Would you like us to post a message on your site letting people know, if so, what message?

By: Dave Lee

Dave Lee — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 16:25:45 +0000

This is something that makes me wonder, too. I did a piece about it for the Guardian… http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/aug/07/socialnetworking.myspace

Seems of all the soc-networks, only LiveJournal had something in place to deal with user death.

By: SNICE

SNICE — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 09:23:04 +0000

Yeah that is a good point, but what about people you know on the internet? I know that if my accounts just suddenly got closed with no explanation, some people on the net I know would be like WTF?

Anyways, I could go on about this for ages, but I better get some sleep, big day at work tomorrow.

By: Julie Starr

Julie Starr — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 09:20:57 +0000

Sorry to hear about your friend, Snice.
Maybe the thing about leaving a list of your web accounts with an adviser is that they wouldn’t have to deal with passwords at all – just write a letter to the account providers saying you’re gone and please close the account?

By: SNICE

SNICE — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 09:14:25 +0000

That’s the thing, trust. I don’t know if people would, yet they trust email accounts with all their emails and other details. So I guess it would be somewhat similar.

Only reason I have thought about this, is that a friend of mine died, and i’m not even sure what happened to her account on the internet, I don’t think anyone got any passwords. And if something happened to me tomorrow, I guess it would appear if I had just disappeared of the net, and stopped updating stuff.

By: Julie Starr

Julie Starr — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 09:09:24 +0000

Know what you mean about it being a pain changing passwords often and keeping track of them. Interesting idea about a site with a deadman switch – but would you trust such a site?

By: SNICE

SNICE — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 08:59:27 +0000

Its good to know that you can do that, but what a pain if you change your passwords regularly (like your supposed to)

I think there is a market for a website that has a sort of deadman switch involved. i.e. you give it all your passwords, or just one to say your email which has everything stored in a google docs document or something, with instructions. And if you don’t log into this site for a certain period, it trys contacting you. After so many failed attempts at contact it then sends the password to a person of your choosing.

I could give passwords to my family, but they wouldn’t know what to do, i’d have to have a big instruction sheet. The other option is have everything on a USB stick and have that with your will.

Just my opinion on it.