Digital Assets in the Estate: Passwords, Crypto, Photos, and Online Accounts

When I sit down with a family after a death, the house usually gets most of the attention. It's the biggest asset and the most visible one. More and more often, though, the most urgent problems sit on a phone or a laptop. The bills that keep the house insured and the utilities running are paid online. Statements for bank and brokerage accounts go to an email inbox nobody can open. Two-factor codes go to a cell number the family is about to cancel. In my experience, digital assets don't usually fail in a dramatic way. They slip away quietly: an account gets closed for inactivity, a phone gets wiped, or a crypto wallet stays locked because the recovery phrase was never written down.

By digital assets I mean anything of value or meaning that exists electronically. That covers email and social media accounts, online banking and investment logins, cryptocurrency, cloud storage, digital photos and videos, domain names, loyalty points, and subscriptions that keep charging a card. Some of these have real monetary value and belong on the estate inventory. Others have little dollar value but huge emotional weight, like twenty years of family photos. A few, like an autopay quietly charging the estate account every month, are simply liabilities you want to find and stop. All of them deserve a plan.

The good news is that this is very manageable if you approach it in order. You don't need to be technical, and you shouldn't try to hack into anything. You need a careful inventory, an understanding of what the law lets an executor or trustee do, and some patience with each company's process. The rest of this guide walks through those steps the way I'd walk a family through them at the kitchen table: what to protect first, what to write down, who to call, and what to leave for the probate attorney.

The first job is to secure the physical devices: phones, laptops, tablets, external hard drives, USB sticks, and any small metal plates or paper cards that might hold a crypto recovery phrase. Put them somewhere safe, keep them charged, and resist the urge to guess passcodes over and over. Some phones can be set to erase themselves after too many failed attempts, and that would take the photos and stored passwords with them. Keep the deceased's cell number active for now too. Many accounts send verification codes by text, and once the number is gone, recovering those accounts becomes much harder.

Next, look for the paper trail. In my experience, a surprising number of people kept passwords in a notebook, a desk drawer, an address book, or a file labeled something like 'computer stuff.' Check the estate planning binder, the safe deposit box if you can reach it, and any notes left with the attorney. Then go through the mail, bank and credit card statements for the last twelve months or so. Every recurring charge points to an account: cloud storage, streaming services, a domain registrar, a crypto exchange. Annual charges matter too, because they only show up once a year.

Write everything down in one master list, one row per account. Note the company, the type of account, the email or username if you know it, whether it holds money or meaningful content, any recurring charges, and what you've done so far. Leave actual passwords out of a shared spreadsheet. Keep those separately and securely, and share them only with the executor. This list becomes your roadmap. It also gives the probate attorney and the CPA a clear picture of which items belong on the formal inventory, and it protects the executor if a family member later asks what happened to a particular account.

Families are often surprised that being the executor doesn't automatically open every account. California has adopted a version of the Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act, a law that sets out when a personal representative, trustee, or agent can reach someone's digital accounts. In plain terms, it looks at the deceased's wishes in a certain order. First come any instructions they gave through a company's own online tool, such as a legacy contact setting. Next come directions in their will, trust, or power of attorney. If neither exists, the company's terms of service generally control.

The law also separates two kinds of information. The first is what's often called the catalog of communications: who someone emailed and when, but not what they said. A fiduciary can usually request that with proper paperwork. The second is the content of the messages themselves. Companies generally release content only if the deceased clearly consented, through an online tool or estate documents, or if a court orders it. Financial accounts work differently. Banks and brokerages deal with executors every day through their estate departments, and they mostly need a death certificate and Letters Testamentary or trust documents.

I want to be clear about my role here. I'm a real estate specialist who has helped many families through probate sales, not an attorney or a tax advisor, and this article is educational, not legal advice. Access rules, required documents, and company policies change, and the details of your situation matter. Before you request account content or log into anything using a loved one's credentials, talk with your probate attorney. Using someone's password, even with the best intentions, can conflict with a company's terms or create problems for the estate. A short conversation up front is far easier than unwinding a mistake later.

Crypto is the digital asset where small mistakes cost the most. The key question is how it was held. If your loved one used an exchange or a brokerage app, the coins sit in an account the company controls. The executor can usually work through that company's estate process with a death certificate and Letters, much like a bank. If they used self-custody, meaning a hardware wallet or a software wallet on their own device, there is no company to call. Whoever has the private keys or the recovery phrase, usually 12 to 24 words, controls the funds. Without that phrase, the coins may be lost for good.

So treat any recovery phrase like cash in an envelope. Don't type it into a website, don't photograph it, and don't share it in a group text. Scammers watch for estates. They pose as recovery services, exchange support staff, or helpful online strangers, and they move fast. Only the executor should handle access, ideally with the probate attorney involved and someone who understands crypto security. I've seen families wisely move assets into a wallet or account controlled by the estate, with a clear written record of every transaction, rather than leaving them on a relative's personal phone.

Valuation matters for both the probate inventory and taxes. Generally, assets are valued at their fair market value as of the date of death. With crypto, prices can swing sharply in a single day, so record the date-of-death value carefully. Take screenshots or exchange statements showing the price, and keep the wallet addresses and balances on file. That number may affect the inventory and appraisal, the cost basis heirs use later, and any estate-level tax questions. Your CPA should confirm how current rules apply, because crypto tax treatment is technical and keeps evolving.

Social media accounts carry a lot of feeling. For some families, a loved one's profile becomes a place where friends keep posting memories for years. For others, seeing a birthday reminder pop up is painful. Most major platforms offer two choices: memorialize the account, which typically freezes it and adds a word like 'Remembering' to the profile, or close it entirely. Facebook, for example, lets users name a legacy contact ahead of time who can manage certain parts of a memorialized profile. Google and Apple both offer tools that let someone choose in advance who gets access to their data after death.

Before you request anything, check whether your loved one set up one of these tools. If they named a legacy contact, that person may have the simplest path in. Then talk as a family before deciding to memorialize or delete. In my experience, the disagreements here are rarely about money. They're about grief, and people grieve differently. One sibling wants the account preserved while another wants it gone. Taking a week to talk, and downloading the photos and messages you're entitled to first, keeps a rushed decision from turning permanent before everyone has had a say.

Email deserves special care, because it's the hub that most other accounts connect to. Password resets, statements, and notices from utilities and insurers often arrive there. While you work through the estate, an active inbox can be the only way to discover accounts you didn't know about. Don't close it until the inventory feels complete and your attorney agrees. When you do close accounts, keep a simple record of the date, the company, what was downloaded, and who made the request. That record protects the executor and answers questions that come up months later.

Of everything in a digital estate, the photos are what families fight hardest to save, and they're the easiest to lose. They may be spread across a phone, a cloud account, an old laptop, a camera's memory card, and a box of external drives in the garage. Cloud storage subscriptions are often paid by a credit card that gets canceled after the death, and once payments stop, the provider may eventually delete the files. Older hard drives can fail without warning. That's why I encourage families to make photos one of their first projects, ideally within the first few weeks.

Here's a sequence that works well. First, keep any cloud storage subscription paid for now, even if it's a small monthly charge to the estate. Next, gather every device and drive in one place and make no changes to them. Then make a full copy of everything onto two separate drives, or one drive and a new shared cloud folder controlled by the executor. Only after that copy exists should anyone start sorting, deleting duplicates, or picking favorites. Working from a copy means one accidental click can't erase the originals.

Once the archive is safe, think about sharing it fairly. Photos aren't like a piece of furniture that only one person can take home. Everyone can have a complete copy. Many families set up a shared folder so each sibling, grandchild, and close friend can download what matters to them. If there's a house to clear out, I suggest scanning printed albums and slides before the home is listed. Those boxes often turn up in closets during clean-out, and losing them in the rush of a sale is a regret I've watched families carry for years.

The digital side of an estate doesn't run apart from everything else. It's often what keeps the rest working. The online account that pays the homeowner's insurance keeps the house protected while it sits vacant. The utility login keeps the lights and water on so the property doesn't develop problems. The email inbox turns up the property tax bill or the HOA notice before it becomes a penalty. When I work with an executor on a probate or inherited home, the digital inventory and the property checklist end up being one shared to-do list, and handling them together saves real time and stress.

If you take away one thing, let it be the order: protect first, then inventory, then request access the proper way, and only then close or distribute. Secure the devices and the phone number. Keep subscriptions paid until you know what they hold. Write everything in one master list. Bring your probate attorney in before you request account contents or touch crypto, and bring your CPA in for valuation and tax questions. None of this has to be done in a single weekend. It just has to be done in a sensible order, by the right person, with good records.

If you're the one holding all of this right now, the house, the accounts, the boxes of photos, and the family conversations, please know you don't have to work it out alone. I'm happy to help you get your bearings: walk through what needs attention first, help keep the property safe and insured while the estate is open, and connect you with trusted probate attorneys and CPAs who handle these questions every day. There's no pressure and no obligation. Sometimes one calm conversation is what makes the next step feel possible.